Dear Socrates

Dear Socrates

Having returned from the turn of the Fourth Century B.C. to the turn of the Twenty-First A.D., Socrates has eagerly signed on as a Philosophy Now columnist so that he may continue to carry out his divinely-inspired dialogic mission.

Dear Socrates,

There is a passage in Plato’s Euthyphro dialogue where you challenge Euthyprho, a priest of that ancient era, by asking him if he really believes the stories about the gods of Olympus. Euthyprho says that of course he believes them, but you reply that you doubt their truth. So I wonder: Did you believe in the gods at all?

A. Theist
United States

Dear A,

I did, and I do. But I not only doubt but absolutely disbelieve many of the stories that have been handed down about them.

…