Leo Strauss identified “the theologico-political problem” as “the theme” of his “investigations,” and he made the study of classical political philosophy a major part of his scholarly endeavor (Kerber and Minkov 1). Yet despite publishing interpretations of numerous works of Plato and other classical philosophers, Strauss never published an interpretation of the Euthyphro, and he rarely even referred to the dialogue in his published writings. Editors Hannes Kerber and Svetozar Y. Minkov have filled this gap with this book containing Strauss’s previously unpublished writings on the Euthyphro from a period of intensive engagement with the dialogue between 1948 and 1952. For readers without prior familiarity with Strauss’s writings, the book offers, beyond its comprehensive and important interpretation of Plato’s dialogue, an excellent introduction to Strauss’s scholarship and philosophical concerns. For those with such familiarity, it offers a provocative and illuminating discussion of the problem of reason and revelation, and an unprecedented look “behind the scenes” at Strauss’s process of interpreting a Platonic dialogue.
The volume opens with an introductory essay by Kerber and Minkov that details the history of these writings and situates them in the context of Strauss’s scholarly and philosophical endeavors. Three “Parts” follow. Part 1, chapter 1, is the centerpiece of the volume. It provides the transcription of a notebook that contains Strauss’s detailed, line by line commentary on the Euthyphro and Crito, which likely served as the basis for a seminar that he taught in 1948. Chapter 2 is the text of a lecture on the Euthyphro that Strauss delivered in 1952.[1] Then there are four appendices: appendix 1 provides briefer notes on the Euthyphro that Strauss wrote on separate pages and were found inserted in the notebook; appendices 2 and 3 are outlines for two lectures on the Euthyphro from 1950 and 1952; and appendix 4 is Strauss’s marginal comments from his edition of the Greek text of the Euthyphro. Part 2 of the volume consists of three critical essays on Strauss’s writings on the Euthyphro by Kerber, Minkov, and Wayne Ambler. Part 3 concludes the volume with a previously unpublished translation of the Euthyphro by Seth Benardete.
There is something thrilling about seeing inside Strauss’s workshop. Strauss famously made the philosophical “art of writing” a subject of his research,[2] and his own published writings have a high level of polish that can often give them a magisterial authority and seemingly irresistible force of reasoning. The notebook is preoccupied with the same questions as the published writings, most prominently by examining the issues raised in the dialogue under headings such as “the problem of justice” and “the problem of piety,” which appear on almost every page of the notebook. However, compared to the published writings, Strauss’s notebook is remarkably open and searching, raising questions, suggesting hypotheses, and exploring possible answers and interpretations, with a degree of freedom and frankness that the published works do not commonly exhibit. This openness extends to basic interpretative questions, such as why Plato presents his teaching about piety in a conversational treatment and why Euthyphro is chosen as Socrates’ interlocutor even though he is “obviously a fool” (26). More importantly, the same openness characterizes Strauss’s treatment of the central philosophical issues of the Euthyphro surrounding the relation between piety and philosophy.
Strauss’s examination of the relation between piety and philosophy focuses on two main questions. One is the cosmic question of what is most fundamental and permanent in the world: unchanging natural necessity or the inexplicable and mysterious will of the gods. The other is the moral question of the right way to live. Strauss treats the first question in the form of a discussion of the “ideas,” a subject that he addresses far more extensively in this volume than in any of his published writings about Plato.[3] Knowledge of the ideas is the epistemological alternative to piety. Piety means that we orient ourselves by the commands of the gods and “what the gods love” (Euthyphro 10a) and the authoritative stories that reveal their will. The philosophical alternative to piety is that we orient ourselves by means of our own reason and knowledge and not obedience to authority. In order for knowledge to be possible, the objects of knowledge must exist necessarily and not depend for their existence on the unpredictable will of divine beings. Hence, “the basis of all knowledge is the knowledge of things that are identical with themselves or unchangeable: i.e., knowledge of ideas” (34). Strauss’s notebook presents a wide-ranging discussion of the ideas, including topics such as the presuppositions of knowledge and language, an intriguing discussion of the way in which the human individual may participate in the idea of a human being, and searching questions such as, “Why is Plato so certain that there are ideas?” and “What about a theology in agreement with the doctrine of ideas?” (36).
The second dimension of Strauss’s interpretation of the Euthyphro examines the question of the right way to live. Strauss’s discussion of this question focuses on the alternatives of justice or piety. In the same way that knowledge of the ideas is the epistemological alternative to piety, justice is the moral alternative. Euthyphro imitates Zeus who is the most just god, but in order to take a just a god as his model, he must first know what justice is; therefore, he raises the possibility that we do not need divine revelation in order to know what is just and how we should live. The notebook presents an unusually frank discussion of the philosophical attitude to justice, asking questions such as “are the dikaia [just things]… of any interest to the philosopher?” (48), and “why should one act for the advantage of others?” (51), and considering such issues as the philosopher’s relation to the political community (53) and Socrates’ concern for his friends (67). Yet even in his private writings, Strauss does not provide a clear resolution of these issues. While he asserts with finality that “piety and philosophy are incompatible” (42), he also concludes that “S.’s piety remains an open question” (27, 28, 32, 33, 45).
The three excellent interpretative essays are both indispensable guides to Strauss’s fragmentary notes and important scholarly contributions in their own right. Hannes Kerber offers a reading of the notebook on the Euthyphro, discussing both Strauss’s method of reading the dialogue and the substance of his interpretation. Kerber highlights Strauss’s emphasis on Euthyphro’s initial definition of piety: piety is doing what Euthyphro is doing, prosecuting his father for murder, which is nothing other than what Zeus the most just of the gods did to his own father. This definition, defective as it is, constitutes “the dialogue’s hidden center of gravity” (141) in Strauss’s interpretation, because it implies that piety is imitating the gods rather than obeying them, that doing what is just is preferable to obeying the gods, and that we can know what is just without recourse to divine revelation. Kerber follows Strauss’s elaboration of the implications of this definition and concludes with a probing examination of Strauss’s enigmatic suggestion of the possibility of a “philosophical theology” (150).
Svetozar Y. Minkov addresses the notebook’s brief commentary on the Crito, offering six remarks about how it supplements the much more fully worked-out commentary on the Euthyphro. Minkov views the notes on the Crito as a fitting sequel to the Euthyphro interpretation: the Euthyphro establishes the priority of justice to piety and the Crito examines the philosopher’s attitude to justice. He observes that Strauss is attentive to parallels between the two dialogues, such as the regard that Socrates pays in both dialogues to the opinions of the many as well as to the claims of an interlocutor to possess greater competency than the many; by undermining these claims, the Crito reaffirms the conclusion of the Euthyphro that philosophy is “the one thing needful” (160). Minkov also notes continuity between the philosophical issues raised in Strauss’s commentaries on the two dialogues, such as the relation of soul to body and the scrutiny to which the Euthyphro and Crito subject the goodness of the gods and the city, respectively, as well as the importance they ascribe to the power of chance and of the political multitude.
Wayne Ambler interprets Strauss’s lecture on the Euthyphro. The lecture was delivered four years after the notebook was written and it shows Strauss presenting his interpretation in a finished and coherent form. As such, it provides a fuller statement of central themes of Strauss’s interpretation, including the importance that Strauss ascribes to Euthyphro’s contributions to the dialogue, the conflict between philosophy and the city, and the critique of orthodox piety. Yet Ambler interprets the lecture as aiming not to convey an authoritative teaching but to provoke further thinking and questioning. He notes that the lecture offers multiple answers to the question of the relationship between piety and philosophy and leaves the reader to ponder over the relation between them. He notes further that Strauss invites his listeners to reflection by emphasizing the activity of philosophy in his lecture, mentioning words related to philosophy twenty-one times even though it is not mentioned in the Euthyphro at all (164). Thus in addition to elaborating Strauss’s interpretation of the dialogue, Ambler highlights Strauss’s description of philosophical inquiry itself, including the need for courage, the philosopher’s “serenity on the basis of resignation” (94), and the challenge of philosophical wakefulness.
But does Strauss merely raise questions? Does he view philosophy as arriving at a resolution to the fundamental issues raised in his interpretation of the Euthyphro: the possibility of knowledge, the character of the whole, and the right way to live? Or is philosophy merely an activity of questioning and clarifying alternatives without being able to resolve them in a rational way? The scholarly essays in this volume seem divided on Strauss’s position. Ambler does not view Strauss as offering a definitive resolution in his lecture on the Euthyphro (182), whereas Minkov appears more confident that Strauss establishes the priority of philosophy to justice and piety (160) and Kerber seems to view a “philosophical theology” as a possible solution (152). How one resolves these questions will depend on one’s understanding of the issues that Strauss raises in his interpretation – especially, in my opinion, the relation between piety and justice and the possibility of a truly orthodox attitude of obedience to a command whose authority is ultimately based on the fact that it is “loved by the gods.” While the present volume does not definitively resolve these questions, it greatly enriches our understanding of the questions themselves and thereby stimulates the wakefulness that Strauss viewed as the indispensable condition of any genuine resolution.
Notes
[1] Previously published as Leo Strauss, “An Untitled Lecture on Plato’s Euthyphron.” Interpretation: A Journal of Political Philosophy 24:1, Fall 1996, 3–25.
[2] Leo Strauss, Persecution and the Art of Writing. Glencoe: Free Press, 1952.
[3] Ambler observes that the ideas are the main subject in four out of the 21 paragraphs of Strauss’s lecture on the Euthyphro (175). By contrast, Strauss’s most extensive treatment of the Republic addresses the ideas in only two out of 78 paragraphs (Leo Strauss, The City and Man. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1964, 118–121).