Ancient literature in translations into Russian and other languages. Analysis of Plato's dialogue "feast" Plato's feast speech of the Phaedra

The work was carried out by a 1st year student, r/o, 2nd French, Natalya Belikova.

Scene: feast at Agathon. Narrator: Apollodorus of Phalerus. Main theme, summary: wise philosophers gathered at a feast at a certain Agathon, and, being sober (!), and also wise, they speak to each other on the topic of love, the main subject of their reasoning is the god of love Eros.

Speech of Pausanias: two Eros. Pausanias claims that in general there are two Eros in nature (corresponding to two Aphrodites - heavenly and earthly). Eros are “heavenly” and “vulgar”. “An Eros is beautiful only that which encourages beautiful love.” It is interesting how P. characterizes his homeland - “love and benevolence in our state are considered something impeccably beautiful.” The speaker argues in a rather highly moralistic manner, so to speak - “a low admirer is one who loves the body more than the soul.” The gods forgive breaking an oath only to a lover. To please a fan is wonderful, to love is wonderful, but the most beautiful thing is “to do anything for anyone” - this is “more beautiful than anything in the world.” And to please in the name of virtue is “wonderful in any case.”

Speech of Eryximachus: Eros is diffused throughout nature. The main idea of E.'s speech is the duality of the nature of Eros (“this dual Eros is already contained in the very nature of the body”). The healthy principle has one Eros, the sick one has another. In addition, E. speaks of a certain “heavenly”, beautiful love, this is the Eros of the muse Urania; Eros went to Polyhymnia. It is characteristic that “in music, and in healing, and in all other matters, both human and divine, it is necessary, as far as possible,” to take both Erotes into account.

Speech of Aristophanes: Eros as a person’s desire for original integrity. Eros is the most humane god. A. tells the prehistory of humanity (so, earlier, before people, there lived terrible creatures on Earth who had a two-sided body. They combined the appearance and name of two sexes - male and female; the male comes from the Earth, and the female comes from the Sun One day these creatures decided to encroach on the power of the gods, and then Zeus cruelly punished them by cutting them in half). And now each of us is half of a person cut into two parts, each of us is looking for our soul mate in life. And love, therefore, is “the thirst for integrity and the desire for it.” The best thing in life is “to meet an object of love that is close to you.”

Speech of Agathon: the perfections of Eros. Eros is the most beautiful and most perfect of all gods. Eros is very gentle, he lives in the soft and gentle souls of gods/people; this beautiful god never offends anyone, he is a skillful poet. One of his best qualities is his prudence. But there is no passion that would be stronger than Eros. It is significant that the affairs of the gods “came into order only when love appeared among them,” i.e. Eros.

Socrates' speech: Eros' goal is to master the good. Socrates argues with Agathon, saying that in his speech there were too many beauties and beauties, but at the same time too little truth. Socrates finds contradictions and logical inconsistencies in the speech of Agathon (for example, A. claims that Eros is the love of beauty, and not of ugliness, and people usually love what they need and what they do not have. But then it turns out that Eros is devoid of beauty and needs it, but one cannot call something beautiful that is completely devoid of beauty and needs it). Socrates himself characterizes Eros in a completely different way. In his reasoning, he relies on the thoughts of one wise woman, his teacher, Diotima. She taught Socrates that Eros is “something in between immortals and mortals,” He is a great genius. One of the geniuses, thanks to whom all sorts of censures, priestly art and in general everything related to sacrifices, sacraments, spells, prophecy and sorcery are possible. Socrates teaches (from the words of Diotima) that Eros (due to his origin) is not at all beautiful, he is “neither handsome nor gentle, but rude, unkempt, unshod and homeless, he is lying on the bare ground under the open sky,” but on his father's side, he is "brave, brave and strong, he is a skilled catcher, he has been occupied with philosophy all his life, he is a skilled sorcerer, sorcerer and sophist." Eros is located between wisdom and ignorance. The happy are happy because they have good. Love is the eternal desire for the eternal possession of good, it is NOT the desire for beauty, it is the desire to give birth and give birth in beauty (the concept of “pregnant women”). Moreover, love is the desire for the immortal, because the only thing people crave is immortality. Socrates identifies periods of loving maturation in a person’s life, certain stages: 1) first a person loves a body 2) then he understands that the beauty of bodies is the same 3) after that he begins to value the beauty of the soul higher than the beauty of the body 4) and only then the ability to see the beauty of the sciences appears 5) finally, the last step - “the one who, thanks to the right love for young men, has risen above the individual varieties of beauty and began to comprehend the most beautiful,” is already at the goal.

Speech of Alcivides: panegyric to Socrates. Nothing impressive or significant (see point D)). The suffering of a young gay man.

It is interesting that throughout the entire work one could notice many small detailed characteristics of Socrates, here are some of them:
a) Apollodrous met Socrates “washed and wearing sandals, which rarely happened to him”
b) Socrates: “my wisdom is somehow unreliable, inferior. It looks like a dream.”
c) Eryximachus says that S. “is able to drink and not drink” - he does not get drunk
d) Socrates: “I understand nothing but love”
e) Alcibiades: “at first glance it seems that Socrates loves beautiful people, always strives to be with them, admires them,” but “in fact, it doesn’t matter to him at all whether a person is beautiful or not, whether he is rich or has any other advantage , which the crowd extols. (Socrates-crowd opposition)." "He's been fooling people all his life with feigned self-deprecation." He is very hardy, surpasses everyone in endurance; "no one ever saw Socrates drunk." In battle he was brave and courageous, saved A. from death, and served in the heavy infantry. “His speeches are meaningful and divine.”

Introduction………………………………………………………………………………3

1. Plato’s philosophy in his works………………………………. 4

2. Dialogue “Feast” - as a presentation of the basic ideas of Plato’s philosophical concept………………………………………………………………………………….6

3. The theme of love attraction (eros) in Plato’s philosophy……………… 10

4. Eidotic concept……………………………………………………………………. 13

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………… 15

References……………………………………………………….. 16

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Introduction

Plato is considered one of the greatest representatives of ancient philosophy. He combined in his teaching the ideas of his two great predecessors: Pythagoras and Socrates. From the Pythagoreans he adopted the art of mathematics and the idea of creating a philosophical school, which he embodied in his Academy in Athens. From Socrates, Plato learned doubt, irony and the art of conversation.

Plato's dialogues awaken interest and teach reflection on very serious problems of life, which have not changed much in two and a half thousand years.

The Feast (ancient Greek Συμπόσιον) is a dialogue by Plato dedicated to the problem of love. The name comes from the place where the dialogue took place, namely at a dinner at Agathon's, where the playwright Agathon himself, the philosopher Socrates, the politician Alcibiades and others (Phaedrus, Pausanias, Eryximachus) were present.

1. Plato’s philosophy in his works

Almost all of Plato's works are written in the form of dialogues (most of the conversation is conducted by Socrates), the language and composition of which are distinguished by high artistic merit. The early period (approximately the 90s of the 4th century BC) includes the following dialogues: “Apology of Socrates”, “Crito”, “Euthyphro”, “Lazetus”, “Lysias”, “Charmides”, “Protagoras” , 1st book of the Republic (Socratic method of analyzing individual concepts, the predominance of moral issues); to the transition period (80s) - “Gorgias”, “Meno”, “Euthydemus”, “Cratylus”, “Hippias the Lesser”, etc. (the emergence of the doctrine of ideas, criticism of the relativism of the sophists); to the mature period (70-60s) - “Phaedo”, “Symposium”, “Phaedrus”, II – X books of “States” (the doctrine of ideas), “Theaetetus”, “Parmenides”, “Sophist”, “Politician”, “Philebus”, “Timaeus” and “Critius” (interest in problems of a constructive-logical nature, theory of knowledge, dialectics of categories and space, etc.); to the late period - “Laws” (50s).

Plato's philosophy is not systematically presented in his works, which seem to the modern researcher rather like an extensive laboratory of thought; Plato's system has to be reconstructed. Its most important part is the doctrine of three main ontological substances (triad): “one”, “mind” and “soul”; adjacent to it is the doctrine of “cosmos”. The basis of all being, according to Plato, is the “one,” which in itself is devoid of any characteristics, has no parts, i.e., neither beginning nor end, does not occupy any space, cannot move, since for movement change is necessary, that is, multiplicity; signs of identity, difference, similarity, etc. are not applicable to it. Nothing can be said about it at all; it is above all being, sensation and thinking. This source hides not only the “ideas” or “eidos” of things (i.e., their substantial spiritual prototypes and principles to which Plato attributes timeless reality), but also the things themselves, their formation.

The second substance - “mind” (nous) is, according to Plato, the existential-light generation of the “one” - “good”. The mind is of a pure and unmixed nature; Plato carefully distinguishes it from everything material, material and becoming: “mind” is intuitive and its subject has the essence of things, but not their becoming. Finally, the dialectical concept of "mind" culminates in the cosmological concept. “Mind” is a mental generic generalization of all living beings, a living being, or life itself, given in extreme generality, orderliness, perfection and beauty. This “mind” is embodied in “cosmos,” namely in the regular and eternal movement of the sky.

The third substance – the “world soul” – unites Plato’s “mind” and the physical world. Receiving the laws of its movement from the “mind,” the “soul” differs from it in its eternal mobility; this is the principle of self-propulsion. “Mind” is incorporeal and immortal; The “soul” unites it with the physical world with something beautiful, proportional and harmonious, being itself immortal, as well as participating in truth and eternal ideas. The individual soul is the image and outflow of the “world soul”. Plato spoke about immortality, or rather, about the eternal emergence of the body along with the “soul.” The death of a body is its transition to another state.

2. Dialogue “Feast” - as a presentation of the basic ideas of Plato’s philosophical concept.

According to traditional data, “The Feast” was written no earlier than the mid-70s and no later than the 60s of the 4th century. BC, according to the modern interpretation, this date is attributed to the mid-80s, i.e. its creation falls precisely on Plato’s acme. The Symposium is a fundamental text of the classical philosophical tradition and a typical work in Plato's authorial frame of reference. Thus, the logical composition “Feast” is organized as a reproduction of the discussion of the sages regarding the identification of the essence of a certain, specially selected phenomenon - in this case, love acts as such (specifically, the personified Eros of the ancient Greek pantheon). Structurally, the dialogue includes:

I) plot-compositional introduction: description of the conversation between Apollodorus and Glaucon about the feast in the house of Agathon, which was attended by Aristodemus of Kidathia, a friend of Apollodorus; the latter’s consent to reproduce Aristodemus’s story about what happened at this feast, the main one among which was the pronouncement by all those present, at the suggestion of Pausanias, of “praise speeches” to Eros.

Thus, the “Feast” can be classified as a “symposium” (from the Greek symposion - “drinking together”, which meant that stage of the feast when guests moved from eating dishes to an intellectual or entertaining conversation around a crater with wine) - “table conversations “as a literary genre and in this regard, traditional translations of its original name “Symposion” (Russian “Feast”, French “Bunquet”, etc. - in contrast to the Latin “convivium”) do not accurately convey the ideas of its concept;

1) speech of Phaedrus: the most ancient origin of Eros (“the lover of the divine is more beloved than the beloved, because he is inspired by God”);

2) the speech of Pausanias: two Eros (“since there are two Aphrodites, then there must be two Erotes... From this it follows that... The Erotes accompanying both Aphrodites should be called heavenly and vulgar, respectively”) - this postulate of Plato had an indelible influence on the history of the interpretation of love in the European cultural tradition, largely determining not only the conceptual and substantive vectors of its evolution, but also many of its problem areas, including phobias and complexes typical of the European mentality;

3) speech of Eryximachus: Eros is diffused throughout nature (“Eros... lives not only in the human soul and not only in its desire for beautiful people, but also in many of its other impulses, and indeed in many other things in the world - in the bodies of any animals, in plants, in everything, one might say, that exists, for he is a great, amazing and all-encompassing God, involved in all the affairs of people and gods") - the ideas of this fragment of the “Symposium” served as the most important prerequisite for the formation of emanation concepts of the Neoplatonists and the mystical tradition of Christianity;

4) Aristophanes’ speech: Eros as a person’s desire for original integrity [“once our nature was not the same as it is now... People were of three sexes, and not two, as now - male and female, for there was also a third sex, which combined the characteristics of both of them; he himself disappeared and only the name remained from him, which became an insult - androgynes, and from it it is clear that they combined the appearance and name of both sexes - male and female. Terrible in their strength and power, they harbored great plans and even encroached on the power of the gods... And so Zeus and the other gods began to consult how to deal with them... Finally, Zeus... began to cut people in half, as they cut rowan berries before salting... That's how long ago Since then, people have been characterized by a love attraction towards each other, which, connecting the former halves, tries to make one out of two and thereby heal human nature. So, each of us is half of a person, cut into two flounder-like parts, and therefore everyone is always looking for the half that corresponds to him. Thus, love is the thirst for integrity and the desire for it...” - this legend, proposed by Plato, left a deep imprint on the artistic tradition of the West, subjecting love to various romantic interpretations throughout history: from the medieval plot of Tristan and Isolde and the courtly lyrics of the troubadours to Pushkin's letter from Tatyana to Onegin];

5) speech of Agathon: the perfection of Eros (“Eros, who at first was himself the most beautiful and perfect God, later became the source of these same qualities for others”);

6) speech of Socrates: the goal of Eros is the mastery of the good (“...Love is always the love of the good. All people are pregnant both physically and spiritually, and when they reach a certain age, our nature requires relief from the burden. But it can be resolved only in the beautiful, but not in the ugly. Love is the desire to give birth and give birth to the beautiful. This is the path you need to go in love - ... from one beautiful body to two, from two to all, and then from beautiful bodies to beautiful morals , but from beautiful morals to beautiful teachings, until you rise from these teachings to that which is the teaching about the most beautiful, and you finally know what it is - beautiful”); - this “speech” represents the author’s position of Plato (the presentation of which, as is typical for Platonic dialogues in general, is put into the mouth of Socrates), - a position that largely determined: in the frame of reference of the philosophical tradition - not only Plato’s interpretation of the good, but also the European idealism in general; in the frame of reference of the Western type of mentality - not only the history of philosophical interpretations of love, but also the evolution of ideas about love in general, which left a significant imprint on the specifics of the Western type of mentality, including the romantic ideals characteristic of it (certainly connecting love with the “highest good” ), and a kind of transcendentalization of love, and even stereotypes of erotic behavior;

7) speech of Alquiades: a panegyric to Socrates (“he looks like those strong men... whom artists depict with some kind of pipe or flute in their hands. If you open such a strong man, then inside he will find statues of the gods...”);

III) a compositional conclusion, summing up the plot of the story about the feast in the house of Agathon.

3. The theme of love attraction (eros) in the philosophy of Plato

Eros is the companion and servant of Aphrodite: after all, he was conceived at the festival of the birth of this goddess; Moreover, by his very nature he loves the beautiful; Aphrodite is a beauty after all. Since he is the son of Poros (wealth, abundance) and Penia (poverty, need), the situation with him is as follows: first of all, he is always poor and, contrary to popular belief, is not at all handsome or gentle, but is rude, unkempt, without shoes and homeless; he lies on the bare ground, in the open air, at doors, in the streets and, like his mother’s true son, never emerges from need. But on the other hand, he is paternally drawn to the beautiful and perfect, he is brave, brave and strong, he is a skilled catcher, constantly plotting intrigues, he thirsts for rationality and achieves it, he has been busy with philosophy all his life, he is a skilled sorcerer, sorcerer and sophist . By nature, he is neither immortal nor mortal: on the same day he either lives and flourishes; if his deeds are good, then he dies, but, having inherited the nature of his father, he comes to life again. Everything he acquires goes to waste, which is why Eros is never rich or poor.

He is also in the middle between wisdom and ignorance, and this is why. Of the gods, none is engaged in philosophy and does not want to become wise, since the gods are already wise; and in general, one who is wise does not strive for wisdom. But again, the ignorant also do not engage in philosophy and do not want to become wise. After all, this is what makes ignorance so bad, that a person who is not beautiful, and not perfect, and not smart is completely satisfied with himself. And whoever does not believe that he needs something does not want what, in his opinion, he does not need.

The theme of love attraction (eros) plays a significant role in Plato's teachings. Plato comes out with an exposure of bodily love, which significantly narrows one’s horizons and strives, firstly, only for pleasure, and secondly, leads to a possessive attitude in relationships, essentially wanting to enslave, and not make free. Meanwhile, freedom is an unconditional good, which can be given in human relations by love, and in human knowledge of the world by philosophy, and one can hardly be separated from the other. Love helps us quickly take the first steps on the philosophical path: here we experience that same surprise (this is, after all, the beginning of philosophy), which makes us stop and recognize in some person, one of many, unique and unique; it helps to find out why deep feelings and personal experiences cannot be expressed in words, or at least in ordinary words; it teaches what it means to strive for a favorite object, thinking only about it and considering it the most important, forgetting about everything else. These lessons of sensual love, in any case, help to better understand Plato's philosophical metaphors associated with true knowledge, aspiration, concentration on the essential and detachment from the unimportant.

Plato’s dialogue “The Symposium” retells the myth of the birth of love, in which, just like in modern psychoanalytic teaching about love, the themes of loss, passionate attraction and finding what was lost prevail. What is striking in The Symposium is the complete absence of mention of women as objects or subjects of eros, as well as of carnal love. If in the time of Homer and the great Greek tragedians a woman had significant power and influence and took part in public life, then in the era of Plato her role decreased significantly. Women from the upper strata of society were married off in order to bear children and run the household. Women received no education and did not participate in public life. Wives were not perceived as objects worthy of love. The ideal love couple of that time consisted of an elderly, but not old, man and a boy, who received as much emotion, care and attention as the object of heterogeneous love had received in other historical times. Love between men occupies a significant place in Plato's ladder of love, which, he believes, can only be climbed through the sublimation of homosexual desires. Without condemning the physical side of love, at least in “The Feast,” he, without a doubt, preferred its sublimated version.

It is possible that the lack of mention of women in the treatise on love is explained by the intellectual revolution that occurred in ancient times. This revolution consisted of consistent attempts to replace mythological ways of perceiving and explaining the world with analytical thinking, which was considered an exclusively male quality. This was a historical moment when reason rebelled against emotions, and culture against nature. The superiority of spiritual creativity over physical creativity (childbirth) was based on independence from nature and from women.

What is love? How does it differ from eros, from prayerful ecstasy? Eros is a mystery. Perhaps this is the greatest, unstoppable passion, a vague longing for unity, the mysterious aspiration of people doomed to death towards some kind of eternal life?

In ancient cosmogonies, Eros is the primordial, elemental, powerful passion that sets in motion the mechanism for generating the world. The image of life-giving nature, the eternal queen of existence, was, say, an integral component of the mystical cults of the beginning of time. Worship of her manifested itself in various forms, sometimes ascetic, sometimes stormy, orgiastic.

4. Eidotic concept

Eidos (ancient Greek - appearance, appearance, image), a term of ancient philosophy and literature, originally meaning “visible”, “that which is visible”, but gradually acquired a deeper meaning - “the concrete appearance of the abstract”, “material given in thinking"; in a general sense - a way of organizing and/or being of an object. In medieval and modern philosophy, a categorical structure that interprets the original semantics of a concept.

If pre-Socratic natural philosophy understands eidos as the actual design of a [sensually perceived] thing, in Plato the content of the concept is significantly transformed. First of all, eidos is now understood not as an external, but as an internal form, that is, the immanent way of being of a thing. In addition, eidos now acquires an ontologically independent status, forming the transcendental world of ideas (that is, the world of eidos itself) as a set of absolute and perfect examples of possible things.

The perfection of eidos is denoted by Plato through the semantic figure of the immobility of its essence, initially equal to itself. The way of being of eidos in this case is its incarnation and embodiment in multiple things in accordance with its functional structure as a model, as a genus and as an image itself.

In this context, the interaction between an object and a subject in the process of cognition is interpreted by Plato as communication between the eidos of the object and the soul of the subject, the result of which is the imprint of the eidos in the human soul. Eidos, according to Plato, is what a person’s comprehending ability is actually directed towards. Eidos is that authentic thing that is given in intelligibility, in abstraction from our opinion of a thing and from sensory impressions that reflect only the material existence of a thing. Unlike an idea, eidos no longer generalizes, but on the contrary, it singles out and distinguishes a thing from other things.

By the time the Symposium was created, the idea of eidos as such had already been put forward by Plato in the dialogue Phaedo, laying the foundation for philosophical idealism in its classical sense. In the context of the “Feast”, this idea is significantly enriched by the interpretation of eidos as the limit of the existence of a thing - and the latter is understood in this case precisely as a processual desire for eidos. In addition, “The Feast” can be considered as the first historical and philosophical precedent for the completeness and correctness of posing the question of the relationship between the general and the individual, without which such phenomena of the European historical and philosophical tradition as Hegel’s dialectic and the dialogue of nomothetic and idiographic paradigms in philosophy of history.

In late Neoplatonism, such an “apperceptual” understanding of eidos disappears and becomes a “symphony of gods,” each of which is the bearer of self-consciousness as one of the moments of its own nature. Eidos turns into a moment of eidetic being in the strict Platonic sense of the term, that is, eidos is the result-subject of intelligibility, knowledge itself. Eidos are parts of existence that, in essence, remained inseparable from the whole, but in life began to separate and emanate, emanate. In this sense, eidos is the result, the “sculpture” of the life process. It does not yet exist as something in itself, that is, as limited in existence (and such is the existence of bodies and mortals). The whole for him is Nus. However, it is the result of distinction and separation, being no longer whole, but special.

Conclusion

“The Symposium” - that dialogue of Plato, where this thought, in particular, is expressed - is the most famous work on love in the history of philosophy. However, to say “famous” here means to say almost nothing. Over the course of twenty-five centuries that have passed since the appearance of “The Feast,” many hundreds of thinkers, philosophers and literary artists have been conducting an ongoing conversation with the author of the dialogue and with its characters, developing and challenging their judgments. The very names of some of these heroes received the meaning of symbols.

The theme of love attraction plays a significant role in Plato's teaching. In Plato's aesthetics, beauty is understood as the absolute interpenetration of body, soul and mind, the fusion of idea and matter, rationality and pleasure, and the principle of this fusion is measure. Plato does not separate knowledge from love, and love from beauty. Everything is beautiful, that is. visible and audible, externally and bodily, it is animated by its inner life and contains one meaning or another.

Wisdom is one of the most beautiful goods in the world, and Eros is the love of beauty, therefore Eros cannot help but be a philosopher, that is, a lover of wisdom, and the philosopher occupies an intermediate position between the sage and the ignorant.

Already in antiquity, dozens of commentaries on the “Feast” appeared, with more and more new interpretations of it. Philosophical thought returns to this work again and again in the Middle Ages, during the Enlightenment, and in recent centuries.

Bibliography

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2. History of philosophy: Encyclopedia. - Mn.: Interpressservice; Book House. 2002. - 1376 p.

3. History of philosophy. Textbook for higher educational institutions. Rostov-on-Don, “Phoenix”, 2002. - 576 p.

4. Kanke V.A. Basic philosophical directions and concepts of science. Results of the 20th century. - M.: Logos, 2000. - 320 p.

5. Fundamentals of philosophy: Textbook for universities / Hand. author. coll. and resp. ed. E.V.Popov. — M.: Humanite. publishing center VLADOS, 1997. 320 p.

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Plato is one of the founders of all European philosophy. His works, which have survived to our times, convey to us many ideas in which the idea of good occupies a central place. And his dialogue “The Feast” is also no exception - in it the philosopher shows that love is also a good for man.

General characteristics of the work

Before considering the summary of Plato’s Symposium, let’s consider the structure of the work. “The Feast” is written in the form of a table conversation, during which seven of its participants praise the patron of love, Eros. And each of the subsequent participants continues the speech that his predecessor made. The very last speaker is Socrates, who, as an attentive reader may notice, was the bearer of the ideas of the author of the work himself.

The work amazes the reader with the variety of genres to which it belongs - literary, historical, artistic and philosophical. The speeches of all seven participants in the “Feast” are full of irony, humor, comic and serious. Here the listener can find drama, personal confession, and philosophical reasoning.

Plato's Feast: Analysis

Plato conveys to us the idea that ordinary love can be insidious and full of difficulties, first of all, for the lover himself. However, fortunately for people, love is a multifaceted phenomenon. Which path should a lover take? The answer can be found in a quote from Plato’s Symposium, which belongs to Diotima teaching Socrates: “You need to go up all the time, as if climbing steps. From beautiful bodies - to beautiful morals, and from morals - to teachings. Only in the contemplation of beauty can a person live.”

Pathos in dialogue

The reader may also notice that this dialogue by Plato is filled with philosophical pathos. Plato strives to show the seriousness of the issues that are put up for discussion by those present. The philosopher seeks to show how flawed and limiting bodily love is. Through the monologues of those present, Plato leads us to the idea of high love, which cannot be discussed without pathos. The main idea of Plato's dialogue “The Symposium” is that love and the desire for beauty are the main purpose of human existence. Some researchers argue that it was Eros that Plato chose as the subject of discussion, since it is “the inner side of light and radiance.”

Time of creation

It is believed that the date of writing Plato's Symposium is the 4th century. BC e., and according to traditional data it is believed that the work was created no earlier than the mid-70s and no later than the 60s. Modern historians agree that “The Symposium” was written in the mid-80s, that is, its creation occurred during the period of Plato’s own highest creative productivity. “The Feast” is one of the fundamental works and at the same time a typical work of the philosopher.

Dialogue Features

In his works, in particular in the Symposium, Plato explores issues that are most important for all mankind in a fascinating way. The success of his dialogue is largely due to the fact that the philosopher chose Socrates as one of the main characters in the Symposium. In terms of its popularity, “The Feast” has no equal among other works of the ancient author. There is a simple explanation for this - its theme is love. The themes of love and beauty play a significant role in the work. In the philosopher’s aesthetics, beauty is understood as the interaction of soul and body, the fusion of thought and matter. For Plato, knowledge is inseparable from beauty.

The treatise barely mentions women. Researchers of Plato's work associate this with a possible revolution in worldview that occurred in ancient times. It was to replace mythological attempts to explain the world around us with analytical ones. And this type of thinking is traditionally considered a masculine quality. This was one of the historical moments in the history of antiquity, when reason rebelled against feelings, and the culture created by man rebelled against his nature. The superiority of intellect over physical needs was based on not depending on one’s nature and on women. In his dialogue, the philosopher gives a varied explanation of Eros. This is a mystery, and the greatest passion that can lead to destruction, and the power that gave birth to the world.

Beginning of the work

A summary of Plato's Symposium begins with Apollodorus, on whose behalf the entire narrative is told, meeting Glaucon. He asks him to tell him about the feast at Agathon. Socrates, Alcibiades and other philosophers were present at this feast, holding “speeches about love” there. This feast took place a long time ago, at a time when Apollodorus and his friend were still small children. Agathon was also young - at that time he had just received his reward for the first tragedy.

Apollodorus says that he can retell the conversation at that time only from the words of Aristodemus, who was present at the feast at that time, with which the summary of Plato’s “Symposium” continues. The guests who have gathered in honor of the poet Agathon drink and eat. They decide to praise the god Eros, since, according to the guests, his people are undeservedly deprived of their attention.

Speech by Phaedrus

Phaedrus speaks first. The speaker emphasizes that no one can be as brave and selfless as lovers. The main theme described at the beginning of Phaedrus's speech is the ancient origin of Eros. Phaedrus says that many admire this god also for this reason. After all, being a forefather is worthy of respect. Proof of this is the fact that Eros has no parents - they are not mentioned in any source. And if he is the most ancient god, then, therefore, he is also a source of good for people. After all, no teacher, no relatives, honors or wealth, only true love, can teach universal human values.

What is its main lesson? A person should be ashamed of the bad and strive for the beautiful. If a lover does a bad deed, Phaedrus continues his speech, and someone catches him in this - parents, friends or someone else - then he will not suffer from this as much as if his loved one found out about his mistake. And if it were possible to create an army of lovers, then it would be the most exemplary, since everyone would strive to avoid shameful actions and would strive to compete with others. Fighting together, they would constantly demonstrate valor and courage. After all, a person can throw down his sword and leave the battlefield at any time, but not in the presence of the object of his love. In addition, the philosopher continues, can there be such a coward in the world from whom love would not make a real daredevil? If Homer in his works says that God sends courage to man, then this is none other than Eros.

Example of Phaedrus: the story of Alcestis

The summary of Plato's Symposium continues with Phaedrus' statement that both men and women can die for love. An example of this is Alcestis, who alone decided to give her life for her husband, although his father and mother were alive. It was thanks to her feelings that she surpassed her parents in their affection for their son, and this feat was approved not only by people, but also by the inhabitants of Olympus. If out of the many ordinary mortals who found themselves in the kingdom of Hades, the gods released only a few from there, then they immediately released the soul of Alcestis from there, admiring the feat of her love. But they escorted Orpheus out of the dark kingdom with nothing, showing him only the ghost of his wife. The gods considered him too effeminate, since he did not dare, like Alcestis, to give his life for his love, but managed to get into the kingdom of Hades alive. Therefore, the gods made sure that he died at the hands of a woman, while Achilles, the son of Thetis, was honored.

Pausanias' speech

Next, the “Symposium” continues with Pausanias’s speech about the two Erotes. Phaedrus says that the task of praising Eros was not determined entirely correctly, since in reality there are two gods of love, and first you need to decide who exactly to praise. Pausanias says that without Eros there is no Aphrodite. And since there are two Aphrodites, then there must also be two Erotes. There is the elder Aphrodite, whom everyone calls heavenly; and there is a younger one, which is vulgar, says Pausanias. This means that there should also be two Erotes corresponding to each of the goddesses. Of course, all the inhabitants of Olympus are worthy of praise, but you need to know who exactly to glorify. Pausanias says that Eros of the “vulgar” Aphrodite is the god of insignificant people who love the body more than the soul, and also strive to choose people stupider than themselves as beloved. And these people are capable of both good and bad deeds. And Eros of the heavenly Aphrodite is the patron saint of those who love not only the body, but also the soul.

Plato's book "Symposium" is full of discussions about love. Pausanias says that it is worthy to love a person who has excellent qualities. And pleasing a low person is ugly. In addition, the lover who experiences passion only for the body is also low. As soon as external beauty blooms, all his feelings disappear. The one who loves for moral qualities remains faithful throughout his life.

Speech of Eryximachus

The summary of Plato's Symposium continues with the speech of Eryximachus, who says that the manifestations of Eros are characteristic of all nature. The God of love lives not only in people, but also in animals, plants - in everything that exists. Eryximachus says that healing is the science of the desires of the body and its evacuation. He who knows how to distinguish between useful desires will be a good doctor; the one who knows how to create the necessary desires in the body will be a great expert in his field. Eryximachus speaks of the power of Eros and that he gives benefit to both people and gods.

Speech by Aristophanes

Aristophanes speaks to the other participants in the feast with a new idea. He tells those present the myth that previously there were not two, but three genders - in addition to men and women, there were also androgynes. The gods, seeing their power, divided them into two halves. When their bodies were divided in half, they strived for reunification, and did not want to do anything separately from each other. Since then, the halves of these unusual creatures have been searching for each other. Aristophanes calls love the desire for integrity. Once upon a time, people were united, but now, due to injustice, they are divided by the gods into different bodies.

Agathon

Socrates

As we see, the problem of love in Plato’s dialogue “Symposium” occupies a central place. The greatest interest for many readers interested in the philosopher's reasoning about love will be the speech of Socrates. He prefaces his speech with a conversation with Agathon, during which the philosopher, using logical conclusions, comes to the conclusion that in reality Eros is not good or beautiful, since beauty is what he himself strives for.

As proof of his speeches, the philosopher cites a conversation that he had in the past with one of the women well versed in matters of love named Diotima. She showed Socrates that Eros is neither beautiful nor ugly. The god of love was born from the ugly Penia and the beautiful god Poros. Therefore, in Eros there is both ugly and beautiful. For a person, the good is the good that the god of love can offer. And since they would like to possess the beautiful forever, then the striving for good can be called a striving for the eternal.

Diotima explains her point of view using the example of people's desire to procreate. Procreation is a kind of hope for gaining immortality, therefore children are a blessing for humans. Just like the physical body, the soul strives for immortality. Philosophers leave behind knowledge, and this can also be regarded as a form of immortality.

Alcibiades

After Socrates finishes his speech, a new character appears in Plato's dialogue - Alcibiades. He is one of the admirers of the wisdom of Socrates. When he is offered to praise Eros, he refuses, because he considers himself too intoxicated with hops. But he agrees to praise Socrates. In Alcibiades's speech one can trace all the ideas that were heard at this feast. He not only praises Socrates, but also presents both him and those present as adherents of high love. This is also evidenced by Alcibiades’ desire to be close to the philosopher, since he can teach him a lot, and by his behavior demonstrates that he is interested not in the body, but in the soul of his interlocutor. Alcibiades also says that Socrates saved him more than once in battles, and this can only be done by a loving and devoted person.

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AAnalysis of Plato's dialogue "P"ir"

1. WITHkeeping the conversation in dialogue

Analysis of the meaning of philosophical speech, meaningful statements about existence. Plato mainly considers this problem in the dialogue “Symposium”, contrasting Socrates’ speech about Eros (as a philosophical speech) with the speeches of other participants in the dialogue. Only speech that is philosophical in nature expresses being adequately, presenting Eros as an ideal given (hence, as the basis of being) in two forms: in its pure, “unmixed” state (before any existing thing), and in a state mixed with created being. In this case, Eros appears as that phenomenon, the possession of which allows a person to approach the macrocosmic; and as one of the givens that contains beings in order. The combination of these two descriptions, according to Plato, allows us to see the essence of ideal being. “Eros” and “beautiful” appear in Plato as elements of ideal being, that is, “ideas”. The characteristics of ideal being in its own form (without existing) are therefore the characteristics of what Plato describes as “beautiful in itself.” And this ideal being is associated with the physical world, with the world of existence, with the microcosm.

Plato's "Symposium" is so full (like "Phaedrus") of all kinds of literary, rhetorical, artistic, philosophical (and, in particular, logical) content that a more or less complete analysis of this dialogue requires a whole large study. The general opinion of all researchers regarding the time of creation of this dialogue is that the mature Plato appears before us here, that is, the dialogue dates back to approximately the mid-80s of the 4th century BC, when the author was already over forty years old. This maturity affects the logical methods of dialogue. Generally speaking, Plato was very reluctant to venture into purely abstract logic. This latter always lurks under the cover of mythological, poetic and symbolic images. But, asking yourself the question of what is the main logical structure of the “Symposium” and trying to extract it from the rich artistic fabric of the dialogue, the most correct, perhaps, would be to turn your main attention to the ascent from the material world to the ideal depicted here.

As for the Symposium, Plato uses here at least one very important possibility, namely, he interprets the idea of a thing as the limit of its formation. The concept of a limit is well known not only to modern mathematicians, it was also well known to Plato. He knew that a certain sequence of quantities, increasing according to a certain law, can be continued to infinity and can come as close as desired to the main limit, yet never reach it. It is this interpretation of the idea of a thing as its infinite limit that constitutes the philosophical and logical content of the dialogue “The Feast”.

With this dialogue, Plato made a significant contribution to the history of logic, but, being a poet and mythologist, rhetorician and playwright, Plato clothed this eternal striving of a thing to its limit in that which, of all everyday guises, is most distinguished by endless striving, and striving as intensely as possible, and He specifically attributed it to the area of love relationships: love, after all, is also an eternal desire and also always has a definite goal, although it achieves it very rarely and not for long.

The dialogue “The Feast” belongs to the genre of table conversations (symposiums), which were started by Plato and which had analogies not only on Greek, but also on Roman soil, not only in the literature of antiquity, but also in Christian literature during the formation of the Middle Ages.

The topics of table conversations changed over time, but the conversation itself represented the second stage of the feast, when, after a hearty meal, the guests turned to wine. Over a cup of wine, the general conversation was not only entertaining, but also highly intellectual, philosophical, ethical, and aesthetic in nature. Entertainment did not at all interfere with a serious conversation; it only helped to clothe it in a light, half-joking form, which was in harmony with the feast atmosphere.

Plato's "Symposium" has long been classified, not without reason, as an ethical dialogue. It had a subtitle given to it by Thrasyllus - “On the Good,” and according to some evidence (Aristotle), Plato’s “Symposium” was called “speeches on love.” Both of these subtitles do not contradict each other, since the theme of the dialogue is the ascent of man to the highest good, which is nothing more than the embodiment of the idea of heavenly love.

The entire dialogue is a story about a feast held on the occasion of the victory of the tragic poet Agathon in the Athenian theater. The story is told from the perspective of Socrates' student, Apollodorus of Phalerum. Thus, we have before us a “story within a story,” a reflection of the reflection of the experiences of Socrates’ two friends.

2. Pposition and arguments I talkspeakers on the issue under consideration

So, intro. It cannot be said that it is full of philosophical content; it only represents a kind of literary exposition. It also introduces the main characters of the dialogue, as well as outlines the theme of the entire subsequent narrative. The introduction begins with a story about a meeting of a certain Apollodorus from Phalerum with a certain Glaucon, as well as the latter’s request to talk about the feast in the house of Agathon and Apollodorus’s agreement to do this from the words of a certain Aristodemus from Kidafin, who was personally present at the feast.

What follows is Aristodemus's account of the circumstances preceding the feast: Aristodemus's meeting with Socrates, his invitation to the feast, Socrates's late arrival, Aristodemus's kind meeting at Agathon's house, and the proposal of one of the guests, Pausanias, not only to take part in the feast, but to pronounce a commendable note to each of its main participants. speech to Eros, god of love.

With the consent of all the other participants in the feast, Phaedrus begins the conversation about Eros, and quite logically, since he talks about the ancient origin of Eros. "Eros is the greatest god, whom people and gods admire for many reasons, not least because of his origin: after all, it is honorable to be the most ancient god. And proof of this is the absence of his parents... Earth and Eros were born after Chaos “that is, existence and love are inseparable and are the most ancient categories.

Phaedrus's speech is still devoid of analytical power and exposes only the most general properties of Eros, which have been discussed since the time of the undivided dominance of mythology. Since the objective world was imagined in ancient times to be as concrete and as sensual as possible, it is not at all surprising that all movements in the world were thought of as a result of love attraction. Universal gravity, which seemed obvious even in those days, was interpreted as exclusively love gravity, and it is not at all surprising that Eros is interpreted in Phaedrus’s speech as a principle that is both the most ancient and the most powerful. He speaks of the greatest moral authority of Eros and the incomparable vitality of the god of love: “He was for us the primary source of the greatest blessings... if it were possible to form a state out of lovers and their beloved... they would rule it in the best possible way , avoiding everything shameful and competing with each other,” for “...He is most capable of endowing people with valor and giving them bliss during life and after death.” In this regard, Phaedrus begins to develop the idea of the highest value of true love, reinforcing his reasoning with a story about the attitude of the deities towards it: “The gods highly value virtue in love, they admire and marvel more and do good when the beloved is devoted to the lover than when a lover is devoted to the object of his love." A peculiar conclusion of this speech is the statement that “the lover is more divine than the beloved, because he is inspired by God, and the beloved is grateful for his devotion to the lover.”

3. Lical assessmentnka views of dialogue participants

How freely Plato treated oratory from the formal side is shown by the speeches of Alcibiades and Socrates in the Symposium.

Socrates' speech in the Symposium is full of a wide variety of genres, ranging from dialogical, continuing to narrative, and ending with whole reasoning.

The theme of a man’s love for a beautiful young man, which is so rich in the dialogue “The Feast,” should not seem so unusual if we approach it historically. Many millennia of matriarchy determined a peculiar reaction of the mythological ideas of the Greeks in their social existence. The myth of the birth of Athena from the head of Zeus or the trilogy of Aeschylus “Oresteia”, in which the gods Apollo and Athena prove the superiority of a man, hero and leader of the clan, are well known. It is also known that women had no rights in Greek classical society. At the same time, all of antiquity differed from modern Europe in the still insufficiently developed consciousness of the uniqueness of the individual, suppressed by clan and then polis authorities or, in the East, by the unlimited power of the despot. In Persia, same-sex love was especially common, and it was from there that this custom passed to Greece. Hence the idea of the highest beauty embodied in the male body, since a man is a full member of society, he is a thinker, makes laws, he fights, decides the fate of the polis, and love for the body of a young man, personifying the ideal beauty and strength of society, is beautiful.

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Plato's "Symposium" is so full (like "Phaedrus") of all kinds of literary, rhetorical, artistic, philosophical (and, in particular, logical) content that a more or less complete analysis of this dialogue requires a whole large study. The general opinion of all researchers regarding the time of creation of this dialogue is that the mature Plato appears before us here, that is, the dialogue dates back to approximately the mid-80s of the 4th century BC. e., when the author was already over forty years old. This maturity affects the logical methods of dialogue. Generally speaking, Plato was very reluctant to venture into purely abstract logic. This latter always lurks under the cover of mythological, poetic and symbolic images. But, asking ourselves the question of what is the main logical structure of the “Symposium” and trying to extract it from the rich artistic fabric of the dialogue, the most correct, perhaps, would be to turn our main attention to the ascent from the material world to the ideal depicted here.

Plato introduced the concept of idea (or "eidos") in earlier dialogues. However, in the most meaningful of them, the Phaedo, if we approach it with all logical rigor, Plato is still limited to almost only pointing out the very principle of the need to recognize for every thing (including the soul and life) also its idea. But for the characterization of the soul and life, and especially for the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, this was not enough. After all, every insignificant thing, and a thing that exists only for a short time, also has its own idea, nevertheless, such things are temporary and it costs nothing to destroy them. At the stage of even the Phaedo, Plato is still far from using all the logical possibilities that arose among philosophers after he distinguished between a thing and the idea of a thing.

The composition of "The Feast" is very easy to analyze due to the fact that it is not difficult to trace its structure: between a short introduction and the same conclusion, the dialogue contains seven speeches, each of which treats one or another aspect of the same theme - the theme of love. First of all, attention is drawn to the unusual logical sequence both within each of the seven speeches and in the relationship of all speeches.

With the consent of all the other participants in the feast, Phaedrus begins the conversation about Eros, and quite logically, since he talks about the ancient origin of Eros. "Eros is the greatest god, whom people and gods admire for many reasons, not least because of his origin: after all, it is honorable to be the most ancient god. And proof of this is the absence of his parents... Earth and Eros were born after Chaos," that is, existence and love are inseparable and are the most ancient categories.

Phaedrus's speech is still devoid of analytical power and exposes only the most general properties of Eros, which have been discussed since the time of the undivided dominance of mythology. Since the objective world was imagined in ancient times to be as concrete and as sensual as possible, it is not at all surprising that all movements in the world were thought of as a result of love attraction. Universal gravity, which seemed obvious even in those days, was interpreted as exclusively love gravity, and it is not at all surprising that Eros is interpreted in Phaedrus’s speech as a principle that is both the most ancient and the most powerful. He speaks of the greatest moral authority of Eros and the incomparable vitality of the god of love: “He was for us the primary source of the greatest blessings... if it were possible to form a state out of lovers and their beloved... they would rule it in the best possible way, avoiding everything shameful and competing with each other,” for “...He is most capable of endowing people with valor and giving them bliss during life and after death.” In this regard, Phaedrus begins to develop the idea of the highest value of true love, reinforcing his reasoning with a story about the attitude of the deities towards it: “The gods highly value virtue in love, they admire and marvel more and do good when the beloved is devoted to the lover than when a lover is devoted to the object of his love." A peculiar conclusion of this speech is the statement that “the lover is more divine than the beloved, because he is inspired by God, and the beloved is grateful for his devotion to the lover.”

Discussions about the nature of love continue in the second speech - the speech of Pausanias. The theory of Eros, outlined in the first speech, even from the point of view of that time seemed too general and alien to any analysis. Indeed, in Eros there is a higher principle, but there is also a lower one. Mythology suggested that the highest is something spatially higher, that is, heavenly; and the traditional doctrine of the ancient world about the superiority of the masculine principle over the feminine suggested that the highest is necessarily masculine. Consequently, the highest Eros is love between men. And since by the time of Plato they had already learned to distinguish the mental from the physical and value the first above the second, then male love turned out to be the most spiritual love in Pausanias’ speech.

In the speech of Pausanias, specific images personifying higher and lower love are two Eros and, by analogy with them, two Aphrodites. Since nothing in itself is either beautiful or ugly, the criterion for the beautiful Eros is his origin from the Heavenly Aphrodite, in contrast to the vulgar Eros, the son of the Vulgar Aphrodite. Aphrodite Poshlaya is involved in both the masculine and feminine principles. Eros of Aphrodite is vulgar and capable of anything. This is exactly the kind of love with which insignificant people love, and they love, firstly, women no less than young men, and secondly, they love their loved ones more for the sake of their body than for the sake of their soul, and they love those who are stupider, caring only about achieving one’s own.” “The Eros of Heavenly Aphrodite goes back to the goddess, who, firstly, is involved only in the masculine principle, and not in the feminine - it’s not for nothing that this is love for young men, - and secondly, she is older and alien to criminal insolence." So, heavenly love is love for men who are more beautiful and smarter than women. For lovers, everything is allowed, but only in the sphere of soul and mind, unselfishly, for the sake of wisdom and perfection, and not for the sake of the body.

The following statement seems to be a general and not very specific conclusion of this speech: “We can say about any business that in itself it is neither beautiful nor ugly. Whatever we do, it is beautiful not in itself, but depending on the fact that how this is done, how it happens: if a thing is done beautifully and correctly, then it becomes beautiful, and if incorrectly, then, on the contrary, ugly. The same thing with love: not every Eros is beautiful and worthy of praise, but only the one who motivates It's wonderful to love."

What follows will only deepen what Pausanias said. Firstly, it was necessary to clarify Eros’s position on opposites, translating it from the language of mythology into the language of more developed thinking - the language of natural philosophy, following the example of the opposites of cold and warm, wet and dry, etc. Thus, Eros with his characteristic opposites was already receiving cosmic significance, which is what the third speech is devoted to - the speech of Eryximachus. He says that Eros exists not only in man, but in all of nature, in all of existence: “He lives not only in the human soul and not only in its desire for beautiful people, but also in many of its other impulses, and in general in many other things in the world - in the bodies of animals, in plants, in everything that exists, for he was great, amazing, all-encompassing, involved in all the affairs of people and gods." Eryximachus’s thought about love spread throughout the world of plants and animals is typical of Greek natural philosophy.

The second speech also gives rise to another problem: the cosmic opposites outlined in it could not be thought of dualistically, but it was necessary to balance them with the help of the theory of the harmonious unity of the higher and lower, showing, moreover, the whole inevitability of this harmonic principle of Eros and the passionate aspiration for it of those who found themselves in the power of Eros. The separation of the two Eros must be subject to the need for them to be in constant harmony, “after all, this requires the ability to establish friendship between the two most hostile principles in the body and instill in them mutual love.” The beneficence of two Eros is possible only if they are in harmony, also in the sense of the correct alternation of the seasons and the state of the atmosphere that is beneficial for humans. “The properties of the seasons depend on both of them. When the principles, heat and cold, dryness and moisture, are mastered by moderate love and they merge with each other judiciously and harmoniously, the year is abundant, it brings health, does not cause much harm. But when the seasons fall under the influence of the unbridled Eros, the rapist Eros, he destroys and spoils a lot." Finally, sacrifices and fortune telling are also acts of love harmony, between people and gods, for this is connected “with the protection of love and its healing.”

A logical continuation of both thoughts expressed in the second and third speeches is found in the fourth speech - the speech of Aristophanes. Aristophanes composes a myth about primitive existence in the form of both men and women, or ANDROGYNS. Since these people were very strong and plotted against Zeus, the latter cuts each androgyne into two halves, scatters them throughout the world and forces them to eternally seek each other to restore their former fullness and power. Therefore, Eros is the desire of dissected human halves towards one another for the sake of restoring integrity: “Love is the thirst for integrity and the desire for it.”

Aristophanes' speech is one of the most interesting examples of Plato's myth-making. In the myth created by Plato, both his own fantasies and some generally accepted mythological and philosophical views are intertwined. The generally accepted romantic interpretation of this myth as a myth about the desire of two souls for mutual union has nothing in common with Plato's myths about monsters, divided in half and eternally thirsting for physical union. One can agree with the interpretation of K. Reinhard, who sees in him the desire for the ancient integrity and unity of man, purely physical, instead of the divinely beautiful integrity with its ascent from the body to the spirit, from earthly beauty to the highest idea.

The general result of the first four speeches boils down to the fact that Eros is the primordial world integrity, calling loving couples to unity on the basis of their irresistible mutual attraction and the search for universal and blissful serenity.

Further development of this position required the concretization of Eros as a purely vital human aspiration, and secondly, its interpretation using a general philosophical method, not even limited to natural philosophy.

Agathon, unlike previous speakers, lists individual specific essential properties of Eros: beauty, eternal youth, tenderness, flexibility of the body, perfection, his non-recognition of any violence, justice, prudence and courage, wisdom both in the musical arts and in the generation of all living things, in all arts and crafts and in the ordering of all the affairs of the gods.

But the more detailed the various outlandish properties of Eros are considered, the greater the need to present them in synthetic form, so that they flow from a single and immutable principle. This is precisely what Socrates does in his sixth speech, armed with a much more complex method than natural philosophy, namely the method of transcendental dialectics. For the most complete understanding of this speech, it is necessary to understand Plato’s point of view in order to clearly imagine all the unproved for us, but for those times the most obvious prerequisites, in the presence of which only it is possible to grasp the logical sequence of Socrates’ concept. These premises boil down mainly to the ancient CONTEMPLATIVE, but at the same time to the REAL ONTOLOGISM, which, when applied to the most innocent logical constructions, immediately turns them into mythology.

The first stage of this dialectic is that every phenomenon (and therefore Eros) has its own subject. And if something strives for something, then it partly already has it (namely in the form of a goal), partly it does not yet have it. Without this having and not having, no aspiration can exist at all. This means that Eros is not yet beauty itself, but is something intermediate between beauty and ugliness, between blissful fullness and ever-seeking poverty, which is what is said in the prologue of Socrates’ speech. The nature of Eros is middle; he is the son of the heavenly Poros (Wealth) and Penia (Poverty) - says Plato’s myth. This myth, however, is far from the naivety of primitive thinking and is only a poetic illustration of that dialectical unity of opposites, without which Eros itself as an aspiration is impossible. This myth also testifies to Plato’s contemplative-material ontologism.

What follows is the simplest concept: the goal of Eros is the mastery of good, but not just any individual good, but every good and eternal possession of it. And since eternity cannot be mastered immediately, it is only possible to master it gradually, that is, by conceiving and generating something else in its place, which means that Eros is love for eternal generation in beauty for the sake of immortality, for generation both bodily and spiritual, including love for poetic creativity and public and state legislation. Everything living, while it is alive, strives to generate, for it is mortal, and it wants to establish itself forever. But Plato, of course, cannot remain on the basis of such a simple and abstract conclusion. If love always strives to generate, then, he argues, there is eternity, for the sake of the embodiment of which only all the creations of love, physical and non-physical, exist. In this argument, contemplative-material ontology again clearly appears.

The famous hierarchy of beauty also arose here, which became popular for millennia. At first we like physical bodies. However, one can talk about a given body only when there is an idea of the body in general. The physical body, taken by itself, according to Plato, is inert and motionless, but since in reality all bodies are active and mobile, there must be a principle that moves them; and the beginning is already incorporeal, non-physical. For Plato, as for all of antiquity, such a self-motivating principle was what was called the soul. Without this prerequisite, the thinkers of that time did not allow life and existence at all, although they defined the essence of the soul in different ways. The soul moves and moves everything else. In contrast to it, there is also something motionless, just as white presupposes black, top presupposes bottom, etc. This immovable thing in the soul is nothing more than science, and all sciences presuppose for themselves the same eternal and motionless object, which they are called to realize. The hierarchical sequence in the theory is as follows: from one beautiful body to all bodies, from here to beautiful souls, from souls to sciences and from individual sciences to the limit of all sciences, to the idea of beauty, which is no longer subject to any changes, but exists forever and invariably. Contemplative-material ontologism forces Plato here too to teach about the limit of all sciences as the eternal and immovable idea of beauty. With this, Plato again slips from a purely logical path to the path of mythology, and his ultimate idea of beauty, proven by him with complete logical impeccability, suddenly appears in a new, not entirely logical light. The doctrine of the eternal and ideal kingdom of beauty appears, with which not every logician will agree and which cannot do without an axiomatic mythology of beauty, albeit unproven for Plato, arising on the basis of unrestrained contemplative-substantial ontologism. Thus, it is necessary to separate Plato’s logically impeccable proofs from illogical mythology, although in this teaching of Plato about the eternal idea of beauty there is no such separation of logic and mythology at all. And in reality, of course, there is more than just mythology here. This is a mythology that is not naive and pre-reflective, but which has already been constructed logically, dialectically, transcendentally. Later, Kant's transcendentalism aimed to formulate the conditions for the possibility of thinking about certain objects. This is how it turns out for Plato: in order to think about a body, one must already have the concept of a body, in order to think about the concept of a body, one must already have the concept of a soul, and in order to think about the idea of a soul, one must think about the idea in itself. This is the real TRANSCENDENTALISM, and even rather dialectical, and the ideas are objective. Plato conceives of a certain a priori ideal nature, which for the first time makes possible an a posteriori sensual nature. This proves the truth of the statement that Platonism is objective idealism.

However, the seventh speech in the Symposium, namely the speech of Alcibiades, does not allow Plato’s teaching to be reduced to abstract conceptual objective idealism. Alcibiades' philosophical concept is that in addition to the usual coincidence of internal and external, subjective and objective, ideal and real, life also forces us to recognize their unusually diverse and vitally colorful inconsistency. Socrates, it would seem, is an ideal sage who only knows that he constructs various kinds of logical categories of objective idealism. Alcibiades compares Socrates to the Silenians and the satyr Marsyas. Socrates uses speeches, not a flute, to captivate his listeners, forcing people to live in a new way and be ashamed of their unseemly actions. Socrates is unusually physically resilient, courageous and brave - this is evidenced by his heroic behavior in war. Socrates also has an incomparable personality. To a large extent, Socrates is like that, both historically and in the image of Alcibiades. And yet, all this Socratic-Platonic transcendental dialectic and mythology is given in the form of an extremely deep and acute universal irony, which perfectly proves to us that Plato is not just an objective idealist, but also a very passionate, contradictory, eternally searching nature. Objective idealism, as it is given in the Symposium, in addition to the transcendental-dialectical doctrine of ideas, is permeated from beginning to end with a painfully sweet feeling of life, in which the ideal and the material are hopelessly confused and mixed - sometimes even to the point of complete indistinguishability. This is also confirmed by the seemingly random remark of Socrates that the true creator of tragedy must also be the creator of true comedy, which is not just a random aphorism of Plato, but is the true result of the entire philosophy of ideas in the Symposium.

From a logical point of view, the most original text is about the hierarchy of Eros, which ends with the eternal idea of beauty. Diverting from Plato's poetry, mythology, rhetoric and drama, we discover something that we did not have in previous dialogues or had in rudimentary form. It is the idea of a thing that is presented here as the LIMIT OF THE FORMATION OF A THING. And the concept of a limit has already been proven in modern mathematics and physics. Consequently, this is one of Plato’s enormous achievements, which will never die, no matter in what mythological-poetic, symbolic and rhetorical-dramatic garb it is actually clothed in the specific text of Plato’s dialogues.

Central to The Feast is the problem of the MIDDLE. Namely, “correct opinion” is something between knowledge and sensuality. In the Symposium there is not only a mention of it, but the problem of Eros is interpreted here directly as the same problem of correct opinion. Consequently, what is new in the concept of Eros is that “knowledge” and “doxa” are accepted here much richer and more fully, since here it is not just “knowledge” and “doxa”, but what can be called “feeling”, “emotion” ", etc. In the "Feast", although not in a very explicit form, there is a problem of the connection between knowledge and sensibility, terminologically fixed as the problem of the middle. The novelty of the “Feast” in this regard lies in the fact that both named spheres are given as one, single and indivisible sphere, in which it is no longer possible to distinguish between one and the other. Knowledge is so closely united with sensuality that their complete identity is obtained. From Poros and Poros is born Eros, who is no longer either Poros or Poros, but that in which both of them were identified. All possible opposites were united here into one integral life, into one total generation, into one becoming identity. It is here that the transcendental method first reaches its maturity; and the meaning that it is called upon to unite with reality only here for the first time becomes DYNAMIC MEANING, creative dynamics, an active sum of infinitesimal increments. Becoming Eros, dynamic synthesis, eternal potency and principle, eternal generativity and intelligent aspiration - this is the result of Platonism at this stage.

The problem of unifying knowledge with sensibility, as well as ideas with being, is essentially a problem of SYMBOL. Transcendental philosophy provides a genetically semantic interpretation of the symbol. In the Symposium, as in the Theaetetus and Meno, the transcendental evolution of symbolism is clearly visible. From now on, Platonism is for us a fundamental and final symbolism with a different philosophical nature of the symbol, and at this stage of Plato’s philosophical development we find the SYMBOL as a transcendental principle. This is the philosophical content of Plato's Symposium.

Notes:

1. The theme of a man’s love for a beautiful young man, which is so rich in the dialogue “The Feast,” should not seem so unusual if we approach it historically. Many millennia of matriarchy determined a peculiar reaction of the mythological ideas of the Greeks in their social existence. The myth of the birth of Athena from the head of Zeus or the trilogy of Aeschylus “Oresteia”, in which the gods Apollo and Athena prove the superiority of a man, hero and leader of the clan, are well known. It is also known that women had no rights in Greek classical society. At the same time, all of antiquity differed from modern Europe in the still insufficiently developed consciousness of the uniqueness of the individual, suppressed by clan and then polis authorities or, in the East, by the unlimited power of the despot. In Persia, same-sex love was especially common, and it was from there that this custom passed to Greece. Hence the idea of the highest beauty embodied in the male body, since a man is a full member of society, he is a thinker, makes laws, he fights, decides the fate of the polis, and love for the body of a young man, personifying the ideal beauty and strength of society, is beautiful.

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