“Beholding beauty with the eye of the mind, he will be enabled to bring forth, not images of beauty, but realities (for he has hold not of an image but of a reality), and bringing forth and nourishing true virtue to become the friend of God and be immortal, if mortal man may.”
This is the ideal kind of love laid out in Plato’s symposium in my opinion. Socrates brings us away from the idea of love in the purely sexual form (eros) but love that is a guide to find beauty. And not normal beauty, but knowledge and a soul that is working to serve some greater good. Love that gives birth to knowledge and new ideas is something Socrates values more than love that merely leads to children.
Symposium makes you think about what kind of love you most value in your life. The problem with reading Plato alone, and not hearing everyone argue about it in seminar, is that I am compelled to believe what he writes. But this time, I’m not sure. Do we have to choose the best type of love? And though knowledge and wisdom are beautiful, isn’t loving and caring for another person beautiful as well? And whether we really need to choose one over the other or if there is some balance we should search for. (or just binge drink and find out what we truly feel. As Plato puts it, “There is truth in wine and children.)
This is the ideal kind of love laid out in Plato’s symposium in my opinion. Socrates brings us away from the idea of love in the purely sexual form (eros) but love that is a guide to find beauty. And not normal beauty, but knowledge and a soul that is working to serve some greater good. Love that gives birth to knowledge and new ideas is something Socrates values more than love that merely leads to children.
Symposium makes you think about what kind of love you most value in your life. The problem with reading Plato alone, and not hearing everyone argue about it in seminar, is that I am compelled to believe what he writes. But this time, I’m not sure. Do we have to choose the best type of love? And though knowledge and wisdom are beautiful, isn’t loving and caring for another person beautiful as well? And whether we really need to choose one over the other or if there is some balance we should search for. (or just binge drink and find out what we truly feel. As Plato puts it, “There is truth in wine and children.)