Platonic, but not Platonist
Below the question of Plato, both in terms of his compatibility with Christianity and his value for contemporary political thinkers, shall be examined. Drawing from Father Andrew Louth’s lecture on the subject, I will argue, alongside him, that Christians and, to add my own commentary, contemporary political thinkers must be Platonic but should resist being Platonist. Watching Louth’s lecture is not necessary to read this post, but I do highly recommend that you do so if for no other reason that he is a better mind that I will ever be.
Christianity and Plato
Of the problems Christianity has had to face, one of the oldest is the problem of Plato. Definitively since the second generation of Christians, most noticeably in the writings of Saint Justin Martyr, but alluded to earlier in Acts 17 with the conversion of Dionysius the Areopagite, the Faith has been influenced, from one degree to another, by Plato. In the case of Justin Martyr, he says, in Dialogue with Trypho, that the goal of Platonism to be knowledge of God (“I expected forthwith to look upon God, for this is the end of Plato's philosophy”)1, then retells how he was led to seek Christ after having a dialogue closely mirroring a Platonic Dialogue with a stranger who, at the end of the exchange, tells Justin:
“There existed, long before this time, certain men more ancient than all those who are esteemed philosophers, both righteous and beloved by God, who spoke by the Divine Spirit, and foretold events which would take place, and which are now taking place. They are called prophets. These alone both saw and announced the truth to men, neither reverencing nor fearing any man, not influenced by a desire for glory, but speaking those things alone which they saw and which they heard, being filled with the Holy Spirit. Their writings are still extant, and he who has read them is very much helped in his knowledge of the beginning and end of things, and of those matters which the philosopher ought to know, provided he has believed them. For they did not use demonstration in their treatises, seeing that they were witnesses to the truth above all demonstration, and worthy of belief; and those events which have happened, and those which are happening, compel you to assent to the utterances made by them, although, indeed, they were entitled to credit on account of the miracles which they performed, since they both glorified the Creator, the God and Father of all things, and proclaimed His Son, the Christ [sent] by Him: which, indeed, the false prophets, who are filled with the lying unclean spirit, neither have done nor do, but venture to work certain wonderful deeds for the purpose of astonishing men, and glorify the spirits and demons of error. But pray that, above all things, the gates of light may be opened to you; for these things cannot be perceived or understood by all, but only by the man to whom God and His Christ have imparted wisdom.”2
In the case of Justin, then, Christianity gives what Plato seeks but cannot promise: the knowledge of God.
Like Saint Justin, Saint Augustine of Hippo was helped in his conversion by Plato, but this time indirectly, for the original Greek dialogues would (with the exception of the Timaeus) only become available in Latin with the translations of Marsilio Ficino. In Book Seven of the Confessions, we see that Augustine read “the books of the Platonists”3 which scholars agree that he means the writings of Plotinus and Porphyry, and that his chief insight from reading these authors was “having been taught by them to search for the incorporeal Truth. . .”4 Being convinced by Plotinus and Porphyry that Truth is incorporeal, Augustine was able to see the falsehood of Manicheanism, which taught, among other things, that God is corporeal. Where Justin understood Christianity as the fulfillment of what Plato promised, but could not deliver, the emphasis in The Confessions (keeping in mind that Augustine might very well agree with Justin’s understanding) is that of Plato leading Augustine away from a materialist conception of God.
With both Justin and Augustine, Plato, or later Platonists, brought the two saints away from philosophies of the world (what Rene Guenon calls “profane philosophy”) and to the true philosophy, meeting the Wisdom of God Himself.
In distinction to Justin and Augustine, Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite, who was likely a seventh-generation monk writing under the figure of the Dionysius mentioned in Acts 17, makes use of Plato not as a simple means away from profane philosophy and a turning towards Christ, but as way to extrapolate Christian doctrine. A paradigm case is the Areopagite’s use of the Greek word “eros”, a word not found in the Scriptures, to describe God’s love for creation. Typically, Christian writers would use “agape”, which is found in the Scriptures, but the Areopagite finds the Platonic understanding of ekstasis, by which the lover is brought out of himself and gives his whole being to the beloved, the meaning behind Plato’s use of eros, helpful in describing God’s love for His creation. Unlike imperfect human love, which will, due to the Fall, always be tainted with selfishness, God’s love is ecstatic and, thus, is without self-interest. Here the Areopagite is not importing Platonic doctrine into Christianity and “baptizing it”, as some have argued, but using extra-Biblical terminology to explicate Biblical truth, a move that the Areopagite would surely compare to Saint John the Theologian’s use of the word “logos” in his gospel, a word, up until then, found only in Greek philosophy.
To be Platonic
Outside of their mutual respect for Plato, what is “Platonic” about Justin, Augustine, and the Areopagite? A unifying thread that runs through all three saints is their constant turn to the incorporeal. Truth is incorporeal and to be sought outside the corporeal world. Our cares in this world, accordingly, must always be subject to our care for salvation. This is already present in Christianity, it is true, but it is the principal theme throughout the Platonic corpus. In the Platonic dialogues, Socrates, or “the Athenian stranger” in the later Plato, is found asking prominent Athenians the meaning of justice, virtue, beauty, and piety. Socrates interlocutors will give him many examples of just rules, instances of justice, or just laws, or equivalent examples for virtue, beauty, piety, etc., but Socrates is not satisfied with examples. Rather than examples, Socrates is in search for what makes these examples just, virtuous, beautiful or pious. Although he only brushes against what it might mean, Socrates intuits that there must be some incorporeal and eternal standard by which these objects are measured against. For the saints mentioned here, this incorporeal and eternal standard is God. To find what perfect justice looks like, or perfect beauty, the Christian looks to the Triune God. It is this looking to God, found everywhere in Plato’s dialogues, that we call here, with Andrew Louth, Platonic.
Translated into the political realm, we can say that to be politically Platonic is to have ever before our eyes a perfect standard by which we can critique, and reform in light of that standard, society. We are never bound to the current political climate or subject to ideology, because no matter how just our society might be, perfect justice can never be equated to this or that political system. No one can tell the follower of Plato that he must accept this system or that ideology, because he knows that these are provisional answers that must give way to an incorporeal and eternal answer. Yet, with this freedom comes an infinite demand: always strive to come closer to the truth.
But Not Platonist
Yet, the Christian cannot be a Platonist. A Platonist is not simply one who reads Plato’s Dialogues and learns from them, but someone who adopts the later additions by Plotinus and Porphyry, who create a theology around Plato and even incorporate a number of Pagan oracle traditions into this theology. In Platonism, this theologizing of Plato, it is not simply the case that ultimate truth is incorporeal, but that the corporeal world is evil and must be escaped. Plotinus gives the most lucid explication of this Platonist doctrine in the Enneads, which he calls “the descent of the soul.” As Plato influenced Christianity, so did Platonism…but the later led to the heresy known as Gnosticism. Christians cannot accept this doctrine, which is central to Platonism, because we are told in the Scriptures that when God created the world that He called it “very good.” Further, the doctrine of resurrection, that we shall all rise as Christ did, is in stark contradiction to the Platonist desire to leave the body for good.
Politically, the equivalent to Platonism would be anti-natalism, trans, or a flee from practical issues and into ideological solipsism. If the world is evil, or if matter is restrictive of spirit, then the body is a hinderance to self-actualization (the body is in the way of my spiritual identity), should not be forced upon others (anti-natalism), and is beneath the concerns of enlightened political theorists (ideological solipsism).
Conclusion
Both the Christian and the political thinker have many things to learn from Plato but need to be wary of Platonism. For those wishing to begin with Plato, I would recommend The Symposium (my favorite), The Meno, and Alcibiades I. The Republic is a must read, but since it is the longest dialogue and is the easiest to misinterpret, the three dialogues I mention here are a good place to start.