![]() ![]() The emphasis here will not be to focus on the charges or the trial outright, instead we will look at the attitude Socrates takes toward death itself in the two Apologies and how his unique way of contending and discussing death philosophically expands our own concepts surrounding end-of-life matters. But, it was also because he was making himself known by calling into question the widely held beliefs of those who would be offended when shown their opinions were wrong. He was officially charged with impiety (asebeia/ἀσέβεια) and for corrupting the youth of Athens. The way we understand Socrates is by knowing that he died doing philosophy. For this paper we’ll focus on the relevance of death and how mortality relates to the philosophy of Socrates. ![]() Although the two accounts differ in certain respects, when combined, they offer the only historical records of the trial. In the introduction to Xenophon’s two works, Raymond Larson tells us that Plato’s account of the trial was probably first hand, whereas Xenophon’s account was through the secondary source of a mutual friend of Socrates, Plato and Xenophon, a man named Hermogenes (17). The account of the trial that lead to his death sentence is famously documented by Plato in the Apology and also by Xenophon in his Apology. Socrates died 2,412 years ago by drinking hemlock. Mark Matveyevich Antokolski, The Dying Socrates, 1875. ![]()
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