Euthyphro Summary - Dialogues PDF

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This is a summary of the first Dialogue of Plato, Euthyphro. I summarized the second edition, translated by G.M.A. Grube...

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Plato Five Dialogues: Euthyphro The dialogue begins outside of the courthouse as Euthyphro is leaving and Socrates is headed inside because he has been indicted. We learn that euthyphro is leaving the courthouse after just prosecuting his own father for the murder of a someone else. As Socrates learns this, he proceeds to question Euthyphro, leading to the main question of the dialogue being, what is piety? There are 5 responses to this question, though none of the responses are satisfying enough for Socrates because he asks so many circular questions to make sure he is receiving the answers that satisfy his knowledge. The first response to what is piety is “What I'm doing now, to prosecute the wrongdoer, “ (5D-6A). Socrates is not okay with this response because he feels that Euthyphro has avoided all areas of the question. So then Euthyphro’s second response is, “which is dear to the Gods,” (7A). Socrates does not like this response because it is not certain that all Gods find the same things dear. Euthyphro’s 3rd response leads to what is known as the divine theory, he says its, “what all the Gods love,” (9E). The divine command theory rules this response out automatically because two things cannot be the same if they contradict each other. His 4th response leans off of his 3rd, and that being, “ Pious is pious because God loves it ,” (10-12). Socrates then again points out that this cannot be so if not all the Gods have the same love for things. Euthyphro’s final response was that, “pious is the care of the Gods,” (12E). Socrates is not okay with this because he does not think that it should be the job of people to care for the Gods, as the Gods should be the ones who care for the people. The dialogue does not end with the answer for what piety really is because the question, what is piety is an apoetic. An apoetic means that there is no known definition for something because we do not really know what it is....