Athens

Abstract

“He brings a wonderful accusation against me,” Socrates said of Meletus, “which at first hearing excites surprise: he says that I am a poet or maker of gods, and that I make new gods and deny the existence of old ones; this is the ground of his indictment.”¹ Meletus accused Socrates of inventing new gods and dispatching the old ones. This wonder-working power risked punishment to the city of Athens and to himself. Political theory, highly conversant on issues concerning Socrates’s relation to the city of Athens, tends to ignore the sizable role of the gods in Socrates’s account of his obligations and allegiances to Athens.² Not only do gods consolidate and dissolve that relationship, but they also play a very large role in his relationship with himself.³ This chapter examines Socrates’s relation to himself, or rather, his relation to his demon, daimon in Greek, especially as that relates to recent concerns about the political theology of the decision. It is fair to say, this chapter substantially agrees with Meletus and the city of Athens that Socrates was guilty of novelty in theology.

Then holiness, since it is the art of attending to the gods, is a benefit to the gods, and makes them better? And you would agree that when you do a holy or pious act you are making one of the gods better?

—Plato, Euthyphro

The immortal gods alone have neither age nor death! All other things almighty Time disquiets. Earth wastes away; the body wastes away; faith dies; distrust is born. And imperceptibly the spirit changes between a man and his friend, or between two cities.

—Sophocles, Oedipus at Colonus

Plato on his back. He is a pain at moments, that one. He did not want to die.

—Jacques Derrida, Postcard