Euthyphro Flaws

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Euthyphro by Plato, challenges the core ethics of belief and fact. Socrates the main character of this story is being tried by Meletus for inventing new Gods, rejecting the old ones, and corrupting the youth of Athens with his beliefs. Euthyphro the other main character who is a priest, is astonished a man such as Socrates would be tried for such a crime. For Euthyphro also often doubted for his unique beliefs of divine matters and his predictions of the future. The main point of the story however, is Socrates questioning of Euthyphro’s reasoning and claims for prosecuting his father; even though his crime was murder of a murderer. This short essay will highlight and analyze the main faults Socrates sees within Euthyphro’s reasoning for prosecuting …show more content…

To help understand the discussion between the two, one must understand that pious means to be devoutly religious, whereas impious means to not show respect or reverence, especially for a God. In this story, Euthyphro claims to be an expert in all godly matters, so he justifies himself taking action against his father as a pious act; “to prosecute the wrongdoer, be it about murder or temple robbery or anything else, whether the wrongdoer is your father or your mother or anyone else; not to prosecute is impious.” However, Socrates finds fault and is not satisfied with this explanation since Greek law states that to prosecute one’s father for murder is a religious crime in itself. So in choosing to prosecute his father Euthyphro ends up breaking one of the religious laws he claims to be upholding in his decision to go against his …show more content…

At first Socrates agrees but later makes Euthyphro question this definition as well as he provides examples of impious things Gods do that by Euthyphro’s definition should be considered pious. Socrates claims that if each God is different then is each thing the do pious or is it just random Gods one should choose to follow in deciding what is holy and what is not; “my good Euthyphro, different gods consider different things to be just, beautiful, ugly, good, and bad, for they would not be at odds with one another unless they differed about these subjects.” This explanation that Socrates proposes makes Euthyphro once again retract his former statement and agree with the counter argument Socrates

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