Dialogue Between Socrates And Euthyphro On The Virtue Of The Pious Essay Example

emerges and this is what is dear to the gods is what is considered to be pious and what is not dear to then is considered to be impious. As such, Euthyphro believes that a man or an action that is dear or good in the eyes of the gods is considered to be pious but that action or man that is hated by the gods become impious.

Euthyphro believes that there is war between the gods explaining that different gods consider various things to be just, ugly, bad, beautiful, and good. He continues to state that the gods would not be at odds with one another unless they had different thoughts about various things and subjects. However, Euthyphro modifies the second definition and states that what is pious is loved by all the gods and what is impious is hated by all the gods. In this case, he claims that all gods would come to the agreement that whoever commits an unjustly act like murder should be penalized and hence all the gods would agree that murder is impious and should be punished. Therefore, the gods love pious acts because they are pious and from this pious simply means loved by the gods.

From the second definition, Socrates seems to disagree with Euthyphro stating that people would definitely disagree with various cases like the case of murder. He states that the fact that murder has occurred does not mean that it was intended because the murderer would have done so in self-defense or by accident. From that, Socrates challenges Euthyphro to show him a clear sign that all gods see his father’s actions to be impious.

Even if Euthyphro is capable of showing Socrates this fact, that would also not be the definition of pious for Socrates argues that even if Euthyphro is capable of proving to him that all the gods consider his father’s actions to impious what would he have learned from that about what is pious and what is impious. As such, Euthyphro thinks again and comes with a third definition which states that all that is loved by the gods is pious and all that is hated by the gods is impious. Socrates and Euthyphro goes back to the original question: “Is the pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because it is loved by the gods?”

On one side of this question are the gods who are in the act of loving and on the other side is piety. As such another question pops up: does piety occurs as a result of the loving act of the gods or is the love of the gods itself as a result of the nature of piety? As such gods cannot just love something for no good reason and therefore if something is loved by the gods it is because its nature is good and makes it worthy of love. Euthyphro’s third definition of piety is inadequate and it can be explained using Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave.” According to the cave situation, two prisoners who are kept in a cave since their childhood. They are chained such that they cannot turn but only look at the wall in front of them. Behind them is a fire and between them and the fire is

a walkway. Some people are carrying objects and the only thing the prisoners can see are the shadows of the people carrying the objects.

As such the two prisoners believe that the images created by the flickering fire are the real things. However, if one of the prisoners is to be freed and taken outside the cave he would see the reality and understand that the shadows are not real. After going back to the cave he would explain to the other prisoner about what he has seen but the other one would believe that the outside world has corrupted his eyes. Nevertheless, the prisoner who knows the truth should never tire to enlighten his fellow prisoner. From this story Socrates seems to be the enlightened one because Euthyphro only seems to believe what he has always heard about piety and gods and this is not his fault. It is the duty of an enlightened philosopher like Socrates to enlighten Euthyphro about the real nature of piety.