Socrates and the Syrian Sandal #346

A long-lost, recently rediscovered ancient fragment

I was walking down the Panathenaic Way the other day, looking to buy a pair of fancy sandals for my young lover Mnesippos, when I ran into Socrates outside Simon’s shop. I don’t know why the old fart keeps hanging about shoe shops when he barely ever wears any shoes. Simon told me how sales have plummeted since Socrates started hanging out there, scaring away his customers with inquiries about the true nature of footwear. Anyway, I would have to brave him if I wanted to get one of the fashionable Syrian models that everyone was raving about.

“Euthyphro!” No chance trying to sneak through the back door. Socrates must have had some uncanny extra sense when people he could annoy came within half a stadium of him. “My boy, how nice to see you again. Still pious and upright? Still favoured by the gods? You must be if you can afford Simon’s shoes.” He chuckled, but I failed to see what was funny. It was always like that. The old man would suddenly freeze in the middle of a conversation and stare at a stone, or a bird, and start laughing like a madman without any reason mere mortals could hope to make sense of. Well, the god had said that he was wiser than all of us. But if wise meant being like him, I was happy to be dumb.

“It’s great to see you, Socrates, wisest of men,” I said.

He smiled beatifically and stopped laughing. Praise was serious business to him. He didn’t get sarcasm — that was his other infuriating trait. At a drinking party at Agathon’s, a while ago, they’d all made fun of him with wild stories about how men had originally had four arms and four legs. They’d laughed their heads off, but he had taken it all very seriously and started preaching again until everyone fell asleep. At least Agathon paid for the wine, and the cushions were good. Actually, I must try to get some from Diomedes’ stall over there.

“I had meant to ask you, Euthyphro,” he began, before I could even catch Simon’s eye. “You keep coming here, don’t you? I mean, despite me always involving you in arguments that go above your pretty head?”

“Well, yes, Socrates. Only Simon has those Syrian sandals with the elephant bones on them, or whatever they are.” Simon hurried to his back room to get some specimens to show me. “They’re all the rage now. Got yourself any, wise as you are?”

“Well, not yet,” he mumbled, looking down at his beggar’s feet, covered in white dust. “But we digress. Tell me, why do you come here, to this particular shop? Is it only to meet me?”

“No, Socrates. Most likely not.”

“You come here for the shoes, isn’t it so?”

He was on a roll now, asking his usual demented questions that every three-year-old found annoying as hell. What the f—, you wisest of men, would I be going to a shoe shop for if not to buy some shoes?

“Of course, Socrates.”

“Ah, I see.” He stared at his toes some more, but finally decided that this did not do much to improve their looks. Simon, hidden in the shadows, was holding up two different models, waving them in the air to get my attention. I nodded towards the left one and he disappeared again.

“And why would you come here, to Simon’s, and not to any of the other shoe shops all around?”

“Because Simon’s is the best.”

“But now tell me, what makes it the best? And how do you know that it is, indeed, the best shop for shoes? Is it because you’ve been here before and you were happy with what you bought?”

“Just so,” I said. This made him happy. He was so predictable.

“And would you say that our friend Simon here,” he pointed to the back of the shop, and now I saw that there was someone else there. A figure crouching on a crate, taking notes. Ah. His minion, his broad-shouldered and equally brain-dead companion. They were made for each other. The one always talking, the other always taking notes. He must have had hundreds of wax tablets lying around his parents’ house by now, filled with the inane ramblings of the wisest of men. This alone made sure that he’d never move out of his dad’s. He wouldn’t be able to carry all those tablets to another place.

“Hi, Plato!” I tried to be cheerful, but any nuance was lost on him. He was the most unpleasant young man you’d ever meet. No sense of humour at all. No wonder he never got invited to parties. He was fuming when Socrates went to Agathon’s to talk about love, and he couldn’t be there to write it all down. Had to get the gist from Apollodorus the mad, who had heard it all from Aristodemus. Aristodemus, not Plato. He couldn’t get over it that Aristodemus had been there, but he hadn’t. Suddenly, I realised that I hadn’t been listening to Socrates, and he had noticed too. He wasn’t going to let me go, so he repeated what he was saying. He was that kind of person. If you didn’t listen to him, he would repeat everything, until you did.

“And would you say that our friend Simon here,” he said once more, “that he deserves your trust?”

“Of course.”

“You would you trust him in all matters related to footwear?”

“Just so.” Better to agree to everything, snatch the sandals at the first opportunity, and get the hell out of here.

“And you would trust, say, Diomedes in all matters related to pillows and cushions?”

“Whom else? He is the best.”

“So if you wanted to buy a shoe, say, this here,” he reached for the sandal that Simon was trying to stuff in a bag and give me behind Socrates’ back, “and Simon told you not to, would you trust his judgement?”

“I would.”

“Even if you originally had wanted to buy just this shoe?”

“Probably yes.”

“Why would you do this?”

“Because I’d trust that Simon knows better than me what is good.”

“You mean, he even knows better than yourself what is good for you? In terms of shoes, of course.”

“It certainly would seem so.”

“So you would not buy the shoes you wanted, but those that Simon wants you to buy, because you would accept that he knows better than you what shoes are good?”

“Yes, that seems right.”

Simon was still standing there, holding his breath, as if time had stopped, fearing that Socrates might drop the Syrian sandal into the dust. Or perhaps even the touch of the wisest of men had somehow defiled the shoe, making it impossible to sell. Plato was scratching away at his tablet, making sounds like a cricket at noon. I almost expected Pan to jump out from behind the curtain of Simon’s shop, horns and hooves and all.

“Now would this not apply to other trades? Would you trust Diomedes with a choice of cushions?”

“I guess so.”

“And would you do the same regarding the matters of state? Say, would you trust Pericles (gods rest his soul) to know how to handle political affairs?”

“Of course. That’s what our democracy is all about. You find someone you trust, give them power, let them deal with managing things.”

“But how would you choose whom to give power to? Let’s say, Alcibiades and Pericles both propose to rule Athens. But now your teacher tells you that one of the two is better, and that the other is dangerous. Would you listen to his advice?”

“If he’s my teacher, yes.”

“Why?”

“Because I trust him.”

“Just as you trust Diomedes? And Simon?”

“Yes.”

“And would you trust only this one teacher, or all teachers?”

“This one.”

“But is this one really unique? Don’t all teachers share much of the same knowledge, their opinions, their wisdom?”

“I guess they do.”

“So there would be reason to extend at least some trust to the other teachers of the same kind, as well?”

“It would seem so.”

“So let me summarise that for a moment.” Simon groaned in the shadows. This was going to take time. Plato was still scribbling furiously, recording every one of his master’s words. I could actually hear each individual word, and identify it by the length of time it took him to scratch it into the wax. More letters, more scratching. One day all of this wax would be melted down to make more tablets for some primary school, and all his scribblings would be gone for ever. That would be a good day. I was looking forward to it. Perhaps I’d be there, by the favour of the gods, to see all that Socratic nonsense melt away into a liquid pool of wax.

“Are you listening, Euthyphro?”

“Quite so,” I said. I had no idea what he had said, but he didn’t expect any other answer, anyway.

“Well then. So you trust your teachers, because they know many things better than you. When they write important or amusing essays on their tablets, you read those, and you even pay them to read what they wrote. You expect them to know what they are talking about. To know about philosophy, about ethics, about good governance.”

“Yes, of course. This is why I read their works.”

“In the same way as you trust Simon with your choice of shoes.” The Syrian sandal, having fulfilled its dialectic purpose, dropped from his hand into the dust. Simon gave a strangled cry and crawled on all fours, reaching between Socrates’ legs to pick it up.

“Now what if almost all specialists that are knowledgeable about shoes told you that one particular type of shoe was the right one for you? Would you believe them?”

“Yes, it would be stupid not to.”

“Even if your own judgement said the opposite?”

“I guess so.”

“You would not trust your own opinion?”

“Not if all shoe experts disagreed with me. I would at least consider that they might be right.”

“And this must also apply to any other area of expertise, I guess? To cushions?”

“Of course.”

“And even to political matters? To the choice of a leader?”

“So it must be.”

“So you would trust those who are more educated than you to have a better judgement about the matters of state than you do yourself?”

“That would be the rational thing to do.”

“Good. So now let us consider this. According to research that will be done in about two and a half thousand years, citizens with a higher degree in education tend to vote for a particular party. If they have a postgraduate degree, which means more knowledge, they are even more likely to vote for that same party. While less educated citizens are less likely to vote for that party. Let’s say you are asked to give your vote, but you are not entirely sure about who of the two parties is best. Would you listen to those with more or those with less education?”

“With more, surely.”

“Why?”

“Because those with less education are more likely to make the wrong choice.”

“So you would trust those with more knowledge, even if your own instinct said otherwise?”

“This would seem to be the rational choice.”

He smiled.

“Thank you, Euthyphro,” he said. “Now go buy your sandal. And you can tell your lover that it has been touched by the wisest of men. Not my words, by the way. Apollo said it.”

He grinned and without a greeting or parting word he turned away, shuffling up the Panathenaic Road, his minion in tow. I wasn’t quite sure what he thought that he had just proved to me, but, honestly, I didn’t care.

“Now, Simon, hand me that sandal,” I said.