CHAPTER 8

The Elenctic Strategies of Socrates:
The Alcibiades I and the Commentary of Olympiodorus

François Renaud

In this chapter I examine the conditions and strategies for Socrates’ elenctic practice in the first part of the Alcibiades I (106c–119a), the part of the dialogue that Olympiodorus specifically designates “elenctic.” This part is naturally divided into two primary segments: (i) the supposed origin of Alcibiades’ knowledge (the multitude);¹ and (ii) the question of knowing whether what is just and what is advantageous are identical or different.² Socrates will succeed in obtaining the young man’s admission of double ignorance, while the latter will blame himself for failing to heed his tutor, Pericles.³ What, then, are the conditions that apply to this elenctic exchange, and by what means does Socrates achieve his ends, particularly in Olympiodorus’s eyes?

The Relation Between Socrates and Plato

Being the only ancient author from whom there survive two commentaries on “investigative dialogues” (ζητητικοὶ διάλογοι) or “Socratic dialogues” (Alcibiades and Gorgias), Olympiodorus is in some sense a specialist on Plato’s Socratic heritage;⁴ yet his conception of how Socrates and Plato relate to one another is one of some complexity. Overall Olympiodorus presupposes a direct continuity between Socraticism and Platonism. The Socrates of the Alcibiades, especially as Olympiodorus interprets him, is an elenctic critic who produces aporetic doubt, but is equally capable of defending precise theses about the nature of the soul. The figure of Socrates, in Olympiodorus’s view, cannot always be reduced to “Plato.” To begin with the hidden depths of Socratic teaching could not have been wholly accessible to the young Plato. Plato “only benefited from the instruction of Socrates in matters of ethics, and only then at a foundational level; he was still young at the time when Socrates died, and could not have grasped his more in-depth discussions (τῶν βαθυτέρων τοῦ Σωκράτους λόγων).”⁵ Furthermore, Plato and Socrates would not have followed the same communicative strategies. They differed sharply in their use of irony: “Plato rejected the irony associated with Socrates (τῆς Σωκρατικῆς εἰρωνείας ἀπήλλακτο), and he was not in the habit of passing his time in the agora and the workshops, and to engage in discussions in pursuit of young men.”⁶ However, Socrates’ avowal of ignorance according to Olympiodorus was only partially ironic; for example, with regard to the passage (109d) where Socrates asks Alcibiades who his teacher is so that he may himself enroll in his class, Olympiodorus believes that this remark is to some extent truthful. He offers the following principle: because every lover becomes similar to his beloved in everything, Socrates, “qua lover (ὡς μὲν οὖν ἐρωτικὸς) did not know justice, because the young man did not know it, but qua master he had that knowledge (ὡς δὲ διδάσκαλος ἠπίστατο).”⁷ In general, the pursuit of the youth and the habit of initiating discussions with them, which is associated particularly with Socrates, is characterized by strategies for “seduction,” initially involving refutation. What are these strategies? Here, in the light of Olympiodorus’s commentary in particular, is a preliminary answer.

A Tailored and Logically Valid Argument

The dialectical method of question and answer allows Socrates to make adjustments to his interlocutor in the same way that the orator adjusts to his audience.⁸ This method is “cathartic,” because it expels false opinions from the soul much as the doctor expels diseases from the body.⁹ Further, Socrates does not immediately employ all his arguments right from the start of the discussion; he formulates them little by little, in accordance with the needs and abilities of Alcibiades. As Olympiodorus stresses, certain premises that Socrates solicits from Alcibiades are not universal but particular, or contingent, because they are drawn from the young man’s personal experience (μερικαί εἰσι καὶ ἀπὸ ἱστορίας). Hence Alcibiades must offer a sincere reply, without which refutation would be pointless.¹⁰ According to Olympiodorus, Socrates’ dialectic proceeds from like to like (διὰ τῶν ὁμοίων). This is why he entreats the young man passionately to recognize the ultimate object of his desire.¹¹ Nevertheless his argument, in Olympiodorus’s eyes, is invariably valid and able to be recast in a syllogistic form, which the commentator often takes pains to supply. As for any other logically valid argument, Socrates appeals to the common notions (κοιναὶ ἔννοιαι). This is why the elenchus that Socrates practices, as interpreted by Olympiodorus, does not seem to be uniquely confined to Socrates. In effect, from a formal point of view, there is nothing to distinguish Socratic elenchus from philosophic argument in general. Yet it is distinct from the eristic use of argument, whose goal is victory rather than truth.¹²

The Act of Questioning

In contradistinction to today’s dominant tendency that consists in envisaging Socratic dialectic as the expression of his modesty or skepticism, Olympiodorus for his part emphasizes the wisdom of Socrates, with special regard to his role as questioner: “It is true that it is not difficult to reply; quite the contrary, it is rather the asking of questions that is a difficult task (μᾶλλον τὸ ἐρωτᾶν χαλεπόν), much as on a journey it is more difficult to guide than to follow.”¹³ In the Alcibiades Socrates effectively reveals himself as a psychologist with penetrating intuition. He recognizes the secret (and unmeasured) desires of the youthful Alcibiades, which he has been silently observing “night and day” over a long period.¹⁴ If he finally makes his approach after so many years, it is because he knows—thanks to god, to be precise—that the youth now desires to hear him.¹⁵ As master of discussion and divinely inspired lover, Socrates is the ideal guide, because he combines “good intentions, precise knowledge, and expressive power.”¹⁶ It is true that in the “Socratic dialogues” of Plato he is liable to offer his interlocutor an exchange of the roles of questioner and respondent.¹⁷ Most often, however, this is only a formality: as the only one to master the art of asking questions, he maintains this role for virtually the entire discussion. That emerges even more strongly in the Alcibiades, where Socrates remains the questioner throughout the entire dialogue.¹⁸ On a single occasion (if I am not mistaken) he invites Alcibiades to choose between asking questions and delivering a long speech on justice, but the youth declines this invitation as if it were a provocative suggestion.¹⁹ In a word, according to Olympiodorus, the role of questioner that Socrates occupies straightaway indicates his superiority over his opponent and his ability to lead the discussion along his chosen path.

The Act of Reply

Socrates repeatedly insists, and Olympiodorus with him, on the importance of the very act of reply. For it is the respondent who affirms everything that is affirmed within the dialogue, and defends all the theses that are advanced. Socrates resorts to various means of ascertaining that Alcibiades agrees at the beginning of the argument to answer his questions, and, above all, to persist with that role. In effect, Socrates must insist at several points (even at 113a1–2, that is to say after two-thirds of this elenctic first section) on the indispensable role that Alcibiades, as the respondent, is playing.²⁰ Socrates requires that Alcibiades give a truthful response, that he answer both sincerely and fairly, so that the discussion may not be in vain (καὶ τἀληθῆ ἀποκρίνου, ἵνα μὴ μάτην οἱ διάλογοι γίγνωνται).²¹ Let us note that the phrase “in vain” (μάτην), used a little earlier by Socrates (110a3), again pointed to another indispensable condition for their discussion: the willingness of the god (θεὸς).²² To give an answer is to adopt that answer for oneself; hence it is also to accept responsibility for it. If Socrates states that the personal opinions of Alcibiades can (and should) express the truth, he probably implies thereby the relative simplicity of the questions that he puts,²³ as much as the sincerity that should characterize them. As Olympiodorus remarks, “Often the interlocutor agrees to propositions that are not the opinions of the person asking, and on the basis of which the syllogism is constructed.”²⁴ The great weakness of Alcibiades, in the first part of the dialogue, lies in his refusal to learn and then to respond. He will try at several points to avoid replying and will require Socrates to do so for him.²⁵ But he will end up recognizing how well founded his role as respondent was, making the following remark (which recalls what Socrates says to Polus in the Gorgias, 475d5–6): “I need to reply, and I do not believe that this will do me any harm.”²⁶ To this Socrates exclaims, “You are prophetic (Μαντικὸς γὰρ εἶ),” a term of praise that contrasts with his other exclamation a little earlier, according to which it is crazy (μανικὸν) to undertake to teach what one does not know;²⁷ thereby a rather obvious play on words is added to the compliment.

Besides the need to answer with sincerity and fairness as a condition for successful dialogue, Olympiodorus emphasizes the necessity to respond to the questions clearly, without ambiguity, and in terms that match those of the original question.²⁸ He points out for instance errors contained in one of Alcibiades’ answers. In “this answer, Alcibiades makes three mistakes. Firstly, though only asked for a single answer he has given three. Secondly, these answers were not straightforward, but ambiguous…. Thirdly, he errs when he presents ‘being a victim of deception, violence, or confiscation’ as three different things, whereas one can speak of them all under the common heading of injustice…. So he should have mentioned the common term, and so not presented them as three.”²⁹ These mistakes are indicative of gaps but also of stages in the apprenticeship of the young man in the art of discussion and reasoning, the art that Socrates endeavors to impart to him in the course of his refutation.

Agreement and Truth

The elenctic method of Socrates aims above all to reveal the contradictions between two or more opinions of the interlocutor. That means teaching him the necessity for logical coherence in the same breath. In the same way as disagreement between two persons demonstrates that error resides in (at least) one of them, contradiction between the opinions of one and the same person guarantees falsity among them. The aim of Socratic discussion is agreement, and this agreement is, for Olympiodorus, the partial expression of a collection of true opinions, linked with the common notions that each person has within. Though agreement is not necessarily a guarantee of truth, it is still an indicator of probability. As Olympiodorus points out, “Disagreement is a sign of ignorance and of a lack of knowledge; not that those who are in mutual agreement are knowledgeable in every case (for Democriteans, in mutual agreement on the existence of void, nevertheless lack knowledge for that reason, because void does not exist), but the wise are in agreement with one another.”³⁰ An agreement reached in dialogue with Socrates is an even more probable sign of truth, because he at least always follows the internal voice of his conscience, and hence the common notions.³¹ Such is the sense that Olympiodorus attributes, in his commentary on the Gorgias, to Alcibiades 114e: “For as [Socrates] said in the Alcibiades, if you do not listen to your own voice, … do not put your trust in what anybody else says.”³² In other words, even if many people contradict me, it is possible that I am nevertheless correct; but on the other hand, if I contradict myself I am necessarily wrong.³³ Finally, let me draw attention here to a pedagogic progression (that Olympiodorus fails to pick up): Socrates is leading Alcibiades from the notion of agreement between several individuals³⁴ toward that of the agreement of a single individual with himself or herself.³⁵

It is, moreover, striking to observe the similarities between the conception of the elenchus adopted by Olympiodorus and that defended by Gregory Vlastos. According to both of them the false opinions of the respondent imply the presence within them of true opinions that form a coherent set of doctrines, which the refutation indirectly reveals.³⁶ Olympiodorus goes further than Vlastos in thinking of Socratic knowledge as proceeding from the common notions, and therefore as sure and unerring. Further, while Vlastos finds no Socratic solution to the “problem of the elenchus” and sees in the Theory of Recollection, from the Meno on, a specifically Platonic solution, Olympiodorus for his part detects in the maieutic delivery of the common notions a continuity between Socraticism and Platonism.

Types of Questions

The Alcibiades is thus characterized, at every step of the discussion, by the cooperative spirit of Socrates as questioner and adviser. While Alcibiades encounters some difficulties, Socrates encourages him and aids him in various ways. Moreover, Socrates’ tact is evident in the fact that he is reluctant to humiliate Alcibiades in front of others: he specifies that it is because they are alone³⁷ that he allows himself to reveal to him the hard truth, that he is prey to the worst kind of ignorance. In the interests of helping him, Socrates often offers him, as a preliminary step, examples of questions and answers so that the youth may imitate him in his turn.³⁸ This strategic and well-intentioned approach is illustrated by the types of question that Socrates asks, particularly hypothetical questions. I note here their principal types, without endeavoring to provide an exhaustive list. To start with, of course, there is the Socratic question par excellence, “What is …?” (τί ἐστιν), asked of Alcibiades with regard to three objects: the state of embarrassment into which refutation has plunged him,³⁹ the notion of self-care,⁴⁰ and finally (and less directly) the nature of a human being.⁴¹ Socrates also resorts to disjunctive questions (inviting answers of the yes/no or A/B type), which offer the respondent an object of inquiry as well as a choice between two or three possible answers. Finally, hypothetical questions are very frequent and include various subgroups (“If I were to ask you/myself/the two of us …”), and they often make reference to a questioner who is himself imaginary (τίς) (“if somebody were to ask me/you/us …”).⁴² In the Alcibiades, when for example Socrates wants to stress that it is shameful (αἰσχρόν) to be an adviser on matters of which one is ignorant, he resorts to an imaginary character so that Alcibiades may more readily comprehend and accept the implications of this scenario.⁴³ Olympiodorus stresses Socrates’ tact in the use of this indirect type of question, as well as its efficacy: “And because it is boorish to refute somebody in person (for it is thus that, in the Poet, Phoenix, wishing to make an impression on Achilles in refuting him, does not present his speech in propria persona, but introduces Peleus as an intermediary to refute Achilles), Socrates does not rest content with the use of another character, but he even employs the one being refuted to make a greater impression.”⁴⁴ Hypothetical questions also aim at coming to the help of the respondent (in giving him encouragement to persevere or in explaining to him a detail that is causing him a problem), while remaining strategic to the extent that they facilitate the granting of premises needed by Socrates for the completion of his refutation. These questions allow him to bring about refutation without any immediate and obvious damage to the self-respect of his interlocutor.⁴⁵

Dubious Argument and Strategic Aim

Finally, let us briefly examine several dubious arguments that Socrates makes use of for the refutation of Alcibiades. I limit myself here to the section in which Socrates presents justice as identical with the advantageous (113d–116d). Against Alcibiades’ objections that the just and the advantageous are not identical (113d5–7), Socrates offers the following universal argument: everything just is honorable (115a); everything honorable is good (116c); everything good is beneficial (116c); hence everything just is beneficial (116d). Socrates’ approach is both gradual and strategic. At first he makes Alcibiades admit that certain just things are honorable, and that all just things are honorable. He offers an example well suited to Alcibiades, involving the honorable nature of courage, like that of Achilles wounded in saving his friend, cowardice being for Alcibiades the worst of evils (115d7–8). The distinction, in a way an ontological one, that Socrates establishes between courage (manifestation of honor) and death (possible fatal consequence) as if they were two distinct entities (Ἆρ’ οὖν οὐκ ἄλλο μὲν ἡ ἀνδρεία, ἄλλο δὲ ὁ θάνατος; 115c1) is only fair in a limited sense, because it involves two phenomena that are in reality inseparable; courage depends on an awareness of potentially fatal risks.

In addition, Socrates’ argument sometimes errs though oversimplification; for example, he proposes that people are happy owing to their acquisition of goods (Οὐκοῦν εὐδαίμονες δι’ ἀγαθῶν κτῆσιν, 116b7–8), something that appears, to say the least, problematic to the extent that Socrates distinguishes elsewhere in Plato between good things and their use (e.g., Euthydemus 280d–281b). Socrates in fact plays upon the equivocation of the expression εὖ πράττειν, which translates literally as “to behave well” but commonly signifies “to be happy”; he thus surreptitiously effects the transition from “be happy” (τὸ εὖ πράττειν) to “good conduct” (ἡ εὐπραγία, 116b11–14).⁴⁶

Although he almost always defends the soundness of Socrates’ arguments, Olympiodorus still recognizes that Socrates “proves” that Alcibiades does not know utility by building on an “antiparastasis,” because the demonstration (ἔνστασις) that justice and utility are identical would require several arguments; he will only have recourse to this afterward: “If justice and utility are identical, and if it has been shown that you do not know justice, it has also been shown that you do not know utility; if, however, they differ and it is shown by the same arguments that you do not know utility, then you will have been proved ignorant of two things instead of just one.”⁴⁷

Overall, Socrates’ argument in favor of the thesis that justice is identical with utility (113d–116d) has the primary function, at this point of the dialogue, of making Alcibiades aware of his ignorance, and therefore receptive to Socrates and to philosophy. In other words, the aim of these arguments is not the rigorous proof of a thesis but the revelation of Alcibiades’ confusion, of which he must himself become conscious before being able to make an advance toward the true knowledge of himself.⁴⁸ This is why, even if Olympiodorus almost always defends the arguments of Socrates, including those whose logical validity seems to us today to be seriously compromised, the exegetical approach of Olympiodorus has the merit of showing that all the arguments of Socrates, in the first part of the dialogue, have as their primary strategic function to instill into the young Alcibiades a consciousness of his ignorance, as is otherwise revealed by various dramatic aspects of the dialogue.

Conclusion

This short consideration of the formal aspects of the argumentation of the elenctic section of the dialogue (106c–119a) has also sought, indirectly, to stress the contribution that Olympiodorus’s commentary can make today, particularly regarding the Socraticism of Plato.

In his introduction to his commentary on the Alcibiades, Nicholas Denyer makes the perceptive remark that the act of writing philosophic dialogues, in this case a dialogue presenting an exemplary philosopher seeking to attract to philosophy somebody who was to become famous for his unscrupulous life, implies the adoption of a stance concerning the nature of philosophy, its techniques and its power, and its relation to other ways of life as well as obstacles to the philosophic life. These implicit positions (by comparison with the explicit affirmations of the author of a treatise) force the reader to pay attention to all aspects of literary form: “We will miss the dialogue’s answers to these philosophical questions about philosophy, if we bypass its literary form, in an attempt to go straight to its content.”⁴⁹ The merit of Olympiodorus’s exegesis resides among other things precisely in the detailed and systematic attention that he affords to the dramatic action as an integral part of the doctrinal content. In general, his interpretation highlights the following aspects: (1) the moral conditions for philosophy, including the willingness to undergo moral improvement and the capacity for progress in the love of wisdom; (2) elenchus and midwifery as two complementary functions of Socratic dialectic (the mutual agreement of interlocutors and the coherence of the common notions as criteria of truth); (3) the close ties between pedagogy and rhetoric, which illuminate the enigmatic character of both the method and the person of Socrates; (4) the direct connections that join the daimonic and erotic activities of Socrates; and (5) finally, the exegesis of hidden implication, a second-level maieutic, involving the reader’s going beyond the immediate results of the arguments in search of the deeper meaning of the text. These aspects of Socrates’ wisdom in the Alcibiades, such as they are skillfully interpreted by Olympiodorus, deserve even today to be pondered by Plato’s readers.