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Summary. Analysis. Socrates begins his apologia by calling the jury “men of Athens,” wondering aloud how his accusers have “affected” them. “As for me,” he says, “I was almost carried away in spite of myself, so persuasively did they speak. And yet, hardly anything of what they said is true.”.
The Apology Full Work Analysis. Previous. The Apology is one of those rare works that gracefully bridges the divide between philosophy and literature. The work is less concerned with asserting any particular philosophical doctrines than it is with creating a portrait of the ideal philosopher.
The ThemeTracker below shows where, and to what degree, the theme of Rhetoric, Persuasion, and the Truth appears in each chapter of Apology. Click or tap on any chapter to read its Summary & Analysis.
- Anaxagoras
- Aristophanes
- Chaerephon
- Meletus
- The Oracle of Delphi
- Socrates
- The Sophists
Anaxagoras was born in Clazomenae in Ionia (the land of the Milesians) around 500 BCE Like his Milesian predecessors, he was a busy public figure. For thirty years he lived in Athens, where he was the first philosopher to become a well-known teacher in the city that would soon become the hotbed of philosophy. Among his students were the dramatist E...
Aristophanes was a playwright who wrote plays between 427 to 387 BCE. He lived in the time of Socrates and Thucydides, a generation behind Sophocles and Euripides. Aristophanes produced at least forty plays, eleven of which have survived to modern times, including The Clouds, which parodies Socrates. Many of Aristophanes’ plays offer social satire ...
Socrates’ friend who received the prophecy from the Oracle of Delphi that proclaimed that there was no one wiser than Socrates.
The chief accuser of Socrates, responsible for bringing him to trial. Little is known about Meletus and by all accounts, he seems to have been a rather insignificant figure. Plato's portrayal of him, both in The Apology and in The Euthyphro is far from sympathetic. Socrates' cross examination of him in The Apologyputs Meletus to shame.
An oracle is a person who serves as a medium for receiving prophecies or advice from the gods. The oracle of Apollo at Delphi was the most famous and most revered oracle of the ancient world. The oracle declared Socrates to be “the most free, upright, and prudent of all people” rather than the most wise. In either case, the oracle made a positive c...
The protagonist of The Apology, as well as all of Plato's other dialogues. Socrates seems to be a very simple man, not having many material possessions and speaking in a plain, conversational manner. However, this seeming plainness is all a part of the ironic characteristic of Socrates' method. Professing his own ignorance, he engages in conversati...
The Sophists were teachers-for-hire who educated the wealthy men of Athens in the fifth century BCE. Though they were a diverse group with varying opinions, they tended to share a disregard for the notion of objective truth and knowledge. This disregard extended to the notion of objective moral truth, which means that they did not believe in such t...
Summary. In his Apology (Latin for Apologeticus, thought to have been written in 197 CE), Tertullian (ca. 155–240 CE) first proves that the pagans' hatred of Christians has no...
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Apology, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work. Wisdom, Piety, and Belief In Plato ’s Apology , Socrates upholds that true wisdom involves acknowledging one’s own ignorance.
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The Apology Full Work Summary. Previous Next. Plato's The Apology is an account of the speech Socrates makes at the trial in which he is charged with not recognizing the gods recognized by the state, inventing new deities, and corrupting the youth of Athens.
