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PLATO
OFTEN
HAS
BENARDETE
Their quotations for the most part exactly agree with our vulgate,
but sometimes they differ. The most recent and careful study of these
variants (La Barbe, L'Homere de Platon) concluded that Plato cited from a
text that the 'oral tradition' had influenced. Although La Barbe's thesis
has been doubted,I no one has yet, as far as I am aware, accounted for
the variants without appealing to a tradition other than ours. Here we
propose to show that some of these misquotations could be deliberate:
Plato would have forced Homer's lines as we know them to conform
to the context in which he has placed them. We cannot of course
strictly prove deliberateness on Plato's part, nor should it be demanded,
for our 'proofs' will depend on what isn't there: the absent context of
the Homeric quotation. All we can show is that the deformed lines when
read with the vulgate in mind cohere more closely with the Platonic
context than they would do by themselves. It should not, moreover,
strike us as strange that the privilege of argumentum ex silentio which the
ancients attributed to Homer was taken over by his greatest critic:
O y&p FLOVOV-T C 7ty
&k
oc
xod
Tl
9ppVTLarV
?t
(B schol. A 49;
'
tVLVoV4
LC
Xa
LOc X?oL.
153-155).
Numbers in parenthesis after a Platonic citation refer to the pages of La Barbe's book
where he discusses the lines in question.
' 73
where Achilles admits there are better men than himself. Socrates would
not show hlisidleness in his not fighting - he nmentionshis soldierly duty
only to dismiss it (28dio-e4) - but in his not questioning, which he
would not be prevented from doing if he abstained from fighting. It is
not surprising, then, that Socrates wished to distinguish himself from
Achilles even when he was setting up the comparison; for at the end
of his speech, when he mentions those with whom lhe should like to
converse in Hades, Achilles is not among them. Odysseus, however, is
there (4oc I). Indeed the &yop' of the Achaeans is situated by the ships
of Odysseus (A 8o6-8); the phrase `x?Ooq poupq refers to Odysseus
in its only other place in Homer (u 376-379); and although E 338 (or
E 58) would account for xopcovLaLv as a nmetrical equivalent of &T7awOV,
yet once we see that Odysseus lurks behind Socrates' change, the replacement proves to be more than mechanical. Odysseus in urging the
Achaeans to stay after Agamemnon has put them to flight concedes
something to their restlessness (B 2 9 - 2 9 7):
pLzv
8' etvoe,t6,
evOaBE:
5TrL
7rCTCEp0t7TrO(V
p.rvvrsav
Vap
7XPO
&azCXXM2CV
sV!cUt7o;
V
ou vzeL'~otL'
auCL
'zxou
XOpCXVCarV
with Z 403:
oTog yap
ApUsrO
FLOXpC
'reUjxa tocxpxC.
XoCL
ozoq y&p apyLvepxo 7cu,Xcv
706e1-707ai
The Athenian
(242-249).
FtLOLO auvE(6Tao
VO4 iuaeXso4
TpXcaiL
'aa3
e)xta'
sv
8' oc=ln
tv
a(YxOuvv
C`=Ut,
?&X&0tevoLta -p
oV
eLpps'=l
yap
'AXaLo'
oX? a7or7r0C-vVouav,
'vocx aZ
E'XXeLV,
OQ(p CTCLpxXXO?v
yevwrwv.r
O`Opo4
XUC
cL
Cp(,6096
dE
XCP[LTh
O3U? 8-?dac-
Only two variants are significant: ?Ze8op.6voLtfor the vulgate e'TCxpaT0ouac, and oL &yopeu$sig for 6pZGasu&v8pCov. As La Barbe has seen,
Plato wished to remove an address which would be meaningless in
context, and he found in the otov ?RC7tCC
of E 9gS a phrase that easily
suggested it. He might have been influenced as well by Diomedes'
rebuke when once before Agamemnon had also suggested they should
flee (I 40-41):
8chLp6vL',OVCJ
r0vp)ou
I
a7rTO?OUC
''
CP.FvOLxoCd&vocxxLc,
(q ayopeu,e.
occurs
in a simile,
which
w8oxev
8? OOc, Vo0C}r-vLVW,e8o0
VoLGLvV
OUPOV e7re
XXZZOCP{CaLVe CsaT-nj
76OVTOV
&XOCYvov-eq,xaCPaci
"
C?JT
aL
Paris and Hector reappear in battle just as if a god had given a breeze
to tired rowers. The Stranger reminds us of this passage because he
wishes to prepare the way for his claim that Marathon and Plataea
made the Greeks better while Artemisium and Salamis made them
worse (707b4-c7). The barbarian Trojans as hard-pressed rowers were
saved by the heroes Paris and Hector, just as the riff-raff Greeks of
Salamis saw their labours crowned by the hoplites of Plataea. The change,
then, makes Odysseus a spokesman for the Stranger's view of the Persian
War.
175
Republic424bg (202-206).
Socrates is afraidlest Teleniachus' words
to his mother will be misunderstood (a 3 1-2):
T-JV yxp aCOL87V[LiXXG0V C'MOZEOUGa VOP&T0L,
el
v f,y& apXV.YME
&
&Ou6va
'f TLq JXGVOVTF_G17
X-qTL.
V?COT(XT
OVSGUO
CXVO
p&)7t(C,
He can all the more readily deform Homer here because of the previous
lines he does not quote (347-3 so):
01 VU
iT
XOLOL
C
avrxoL,
X tLO,
Mctv
oAvp&aLv O&C
Ya-~~LV 075t04 e'OCXrLV Exa-rcp,
xxxov OTTOV
CX'ev LV.
TOUTCO8o U V4tJGL4 LavOCCOv
Since Socrates has established that the gods are only responsible for
good things, these lines would either have to go or be revised in the
new regime. They vould have to assert just the opposite, the poets and
not Zeus are responsible for novelty; and novelty could then only mllean
a poet's attempt once more to lay the blame for evil on Zeus. Suchl a
song would surely make the citizens reflect (CtL?pOVEouct). [his
indirect expurgation of Homer resembles Socrates' onmissionof' A 3 1xvwhen he gives AgaLaToV
OOLV'~v xodLEPOV ?Co~ &V-nav
mennon's speech to Chryseis in oratio obliqua (33 e 3-394a i; cf. La
Barbe contra Bolling, 3g3-3g7), for any show of' indecency has already
been excluded from poetry, and Socrates is here discussing only miimesis.
Sophist 2i6aS-b6
(296-297). This is a rather different case from the
others. As Socrates quotes the passage in prose, it allows him to veave
together at least three different passages from Homer. It wvillbe necessary, then, to quote the whole:
-
p'
OU'v,
C0fpO?
oVuivov
0s6'cope,
XO6yov xcOOa;
ax'k
TLVO Osv0"Cyv
XcXTOC TOV
C6Oi'*Oq&VOPWI0OL`
6v
I76
06vTaCq
'rL4 C?'yXn6X4
xzL
ev
(u
TOtq
- D1 -
?Q6yoLg
(V) uu -
?J7O+OUS'VOq
-/1)
Tz
TSi.L
- uu).
sa?Ay-Gov,
Os;Oc
8' Z'TZLT&p
CXETI-CV
TE 4vcov
(F
270-I:
te
Second he refers to what the young suitors say to Antinous about the
disguised Odysseus (p 484-487):
o0X6Fsv',
eL Of
xc'L Z EOt
LVOLaLVeO'X60'T
av-rozo T?e)ZOov-r,
0Os6 ECTL.
aXkoXa80oaL
-Tp&)Yp&)L 70XX4,
LLYIV F(pOpG)0VT4.
The Stranger then is another Odysseus; and Odysseus saw the cites of
many men and knew their mind, and hence the variety of customs
that implies suggests the variety of 1{'3psL4and ?t)Voptluo he would encounter. Indeed Odysseus wanted to know about the Phaeacians,
Cyclopes, and his own countrymen whether ( I 202
0 r I 7 5, V 2 0 1):
l
'
Qp0
,, 34ppo-roatPa "c'
ezt
X L OCYPLOL
oU C 8LXcLoL,
T
r?E YpLX?VVOL,
XOCXLO(pLV
VOO4 eGti.
Oeou&qi;.
appears as
perhapsin
OC64 F?_XE-YXrLX6
(2I6
b 7-8).
Eustathiusparaphrasese'7rLTLP'r&(0p
with 7r67Ttq xC fo-0O64
T<V XAC?(V
ay'V0LV
Yptx06aop0L,
Xa0o
?=LCTp(c)p(?)aL
pXvXreC *6 v
OezvOV
7tOCX4>,
TCOV
vC-TvX
O'
F1
76CT&)4C
(2 I 6 c4-7).
P3'LOV
Xk
OVT&()q4
Since
the
Homeric passage refers to gods appearing in the midst of nmen, ox%op(owvt? would be as inappropriate there as it is appropriate here; for
Socrates points to the loftier view of philosophers as they look down on
human life (Heindorf compares Theaet. I13e; cf. Rep. soobg). He may,
moreover, have had in mind Zeus' turning his gaze away from the war
at Troy to look down on the just Abii: xocOopcWtsVoc
OLOV... 'AP3EWv
Te
8LIXLO-O&-roV
&vOpc7rov(N 4-6; A 337). One may also remark that U46Oev,
which does not recur in Plato, is out of eight instances in Homer five
times applied to Zeus and once to Athena.
I77
Symposium
22oC2
z}
-v 38'
ot.ov
(228-230).
' a, ?pEt
avtTOO'
r4~
7u
xcd
z at
?X
eir7
xoCpT?pO6
XCPeP,
&vnp.
oiy,
,rv
7ro?Xev
C&tv
r3oU X?v
Tr
v4Gv
Brandeis University
178