The Divided Line In Plato's Republic

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The concept of the divided line is introduced in the Republic and shows that the line is in proper proportion to the understanding of the good. When I looked at the line, I noticed that it contains two main sections, each divided into two subsections that are proportioned in size that represents to the whole for the understanding of the good. The sections that are given in the line are Imagination (Eikasia), Belief (Pistis), Thought (Dianoia), and finally Understanding (Noesis). Each division within the line holds a level of understanding that is proper to the understanding of the ultimate level understanding. This idea is a person move up the line by increasing the knowledge they have and then moving to the next level of understanding until …show more content…

He then goes one step further and basically calls them out for sophistry and accuses them of treating the other listeners as ignorant. He then moves from this line of speaking and beings his speech where is recounts the meeting with Diotima. He tells all present that it is she who actually taught him about Love and the proper way in which to properly praise love. Diotima begins her lesson on the “Ladder of Love” and instructs Socrates on how to properly use it. The key that is brought up is when Socrates explains, “You see, the man who has been thus guided in matters of Love, who has beheld beautiful things in the right order and correctly, is coming now to the goal of Loving: all of a sudden he will catch sight of something wonderfully beautiful in its nature; that Socrates, is the reason for all his earlier labors” (Plato, Symposium, 210 e3 – 211 a1). We see that the goal of Love is not what is simple and easily visible. The thing we see is beauty and the closer you are to the highest segment in regards to understanding and knowledge the closer you see the truth of beauty and the form of beauty can be known. This is the reason that Socrates is placed within the highest segment of the divided line. He has two parts first to point the flaws out of the speeches of everyone preceding him and to show that all they were doing was offering false praise and making Love into something it is not and that is the path that Sophists use to lure the ignorant people in. Rather, he goes through the concept of the ladder of love which gradually moves people along the line using Love as the basis until they achieve the ability to witness the form of beauty first

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