The name Socrates rings a bell even in the minds of young adults and teenagers, a testament to the fact that he is known across the world by several people who must have heard of his history, his capacity, and his writings Beyond his works or basically because of them ,he is considered to be considered to be the father of western or modern thought.
Though Socrates didn’t exactly author as it would seem he did , he was very effective in passing his knowledge from one generation to another , especially through his contemporaries such as Plato , xenophon , and Aristophanes.
Through the teachings and lessons from Socrates , they became some of the greatest teachers of philosophy that has ever been known.
Plato, amongst others, gave detailed accounts of everything Socrates said and did, he was instrumental in passing the knowledge Socrates taught to the rest of the world.
According to the descriptions and the words of his students , Socrates was descriptions and the words of his students, Socrates was a very sound man, one that was described to be honest , and practically easy going.
However, despite these descriptions and his integrity ,in 399B.C;charges were brought against him saying :
“Socrates is unjust Both because he corrupts youth and because he does not recognize the gods the state recognizes , but rather other new divinities “. These charges describe the fact that a man who has been perceived to be good was unfortunately found guilty of certain crimes and sentenced to death in that effect.
What seems extremely sad was how he was sentenced to death by forceful consumption of a deadly potion containing the famous poisonous plant, Hemlock.
Let’s take the reason he was found guilty ,one after the other , and something interesting would present itself as we go through them.
Firstly , Socrates was said to” not recognize the gods the state recognizes.
” What does this mean? According to Britannica as well as Biography and on the history of the life of Socrates , we find that the ancient Greece where Socrates was a common man who became a philosophical genius , had its development as well as growth , is credited the gods .
It is believed that only the gods could grant political power as well as to grant and bring prosperity.
Ancient Greeks believed greatly in the power of gods and believed greatly in allowing the gods to take charge regard less of the human population .
Of course, Socrates being who he was and sound mind as he was , didn’t exactly believe in the same ideas as the natural or average Greek .
He didn’t recognize what the Greeks would call the existing authority and believed even less in the legitimacy of many of the Greek gods.
For instance ,he was described the sun as a hot rock , which implied that he did not believed it to be the god, Apollo .on another occasion ,he claimed that makes them evil means they simply are not gods.These ideas contradict the existence of gods that are said to be evil and generally,it would seem as though he stood firmly against the basics ideas of deism.
This idea made most of the existing Greeks at the time , especially the rulling class, see Socrates as a dangerous intellectual innovator.
Asides from that, one wonders what they mean when they said, “but rather other new divinities ” The initial statement suggests in some for that Socrates was accused of being an atheist but the addition of the above statement presents an idea that perhaps he wasn’t an atheist as they claimed but rather, he simply didn’t believe in the gods that they believed in the same gods the way they all did.
It would seem that the jurors believed that Socrates saw their gods as false and he created his own gods from the image of theirs but abiding solely to the beliefs in the natural science.
While , the Greeks believed in many deities, Socrates had always asserted his belief in the existence of God, he ensures the constant use of the singular whenever he refers to this said deity .who this God was he did not say, but the Anthenias believed that this was against the idea of the Greeks as it shows that he lacks respect for people , the political standing and ideological belief of the people of Greece.
Often times , Socrates would constantly attempted to ” corruot youths” Due to Socrates desire to teach, he had students and several listeners who enjoyed his teachings.
He would actively gather people and teach them in attempts to expose the people and teach them in attempts to expose the problems with the system, while constantly mocking those in power.