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Anthony Ward Professor Drake HIS 2321- Western Civilization to 1715 21 June 2008 Socrates and Martin Luther King, Jr.-A Comparison of Ethics

Ward 2 When comparing two notable icons of their times such as Socrates and Martin Luther King, Jr., one should ensure to keep an open perspective with respect to sociologic viewpoints and how the two lived their lives. If looking at it in the literal sense, we could easily conclude that Socrates lived and practiced a far greater moral and ethical code of life when compared to that of Martin Luther King, Jr. In weighing the contributions each made to their respective societies however, the comparison appears more in favor of Martin Luther King, Jr. While researching this particular issue, I quickly became aware of a duality within my intended paper; that being not only a comparison of ethics and morality, but also an issue on the validity of civil disobedience and the impact thereof. According to co-authors Samuel Stumpf and James Fieser in their book entitled Philosophy:History and Problems, they relate that: Socrates wrote nothing. Most of what we know about him has been preserved by three of his famous younger contemporaries, Aristophenes, Xenophon, and most importantly, Plato. [] From Xenophon comes the portrait of a loyal soldier who has a passion for discussing the requirements of morality and who inevitably attracted the younger people to seek out his advice. Plato confirms this general portrait and in addition pictures Socrates as a man with a deep sense of mission and absolute moral purity. (Stumpf 35) In the spring of 399 B.C., when Socrates was seventy years old, he was accused of impiety and of corrupting the youth of Athens. Socrates was tried before a court of five hundred and one. After Socrates was found guilty, the penalty still remained to be determined. The convicted was to propose a counter penalty and The Apology is substantially the speech that Socrates made

Ward 3 before the court. According to Lacy Baldwin Smith in her book titled Fools, Martyrs, Traitors: The Story of Martyrdom in the Western World some historians believe that Socrates was never meant to stand trial, noting that the accusations made against him were a legal maneuver by political contemporaries to force him into exile and thereby rid Athens of one of its most unpopular citizens at the time. She writes: Unfortunately Socrates refused to cooperate, and he insisted upon a trial, which, with Platos skill as dramatic narrator, he transformed from a travesty of party politics and personal malice into a public forum to demonstrate that only fools and bigots could possibly believe that he was guilty of impiety or corrupting the moral and spiritual fiber of the city. On the contrary, he alone possessed the double-edged truth: the only knowledge worth knowing is the realization that wisdom belongs to the gods alone, and mankind is far better off trying to practice virtue based on humility and endeavoring to concern itself with the destiny of the soul than with silly earthly material affairs. (Smith 31-32) Platos Apology shows Socrates speaking to the Athenian court, defending himself against charges of introducing new religious beliefs and misleading the younger generation. Although the Apology reads as essentially a monologue, Plato casts Socrates speech as an implied dialogue with his accusers, the assembly, and the larger community of the city. And because the charges call into question Socrates lifelong public career as a philosopher, the Apology is Platos most explicit defense of philosophical inquiry as essential to the well being of society.

Ward 4 In a Platonic dialogue, no single character represents the authors opinions. Instead, we encounter a series of conversations and speeches in which the characters affirm or deny one anothers statements while engaging in cross-examination. Every statement is subjected to ongoing inquiry; at its conclusion, a dialogue leaves the impression that more avenues for investigation have been opened than existed at the beginning. The character of Socrates, as written by Plato, is portrayed as the sharpest questioner and often seems to have the upper hand. However, even when he presents fully formed theories, they are put forward only as hypotheses to be examined, not as doctrine. In fact, as previously noted, Socrates continuously states that his only wisdom is in knowing what he does not know and he appears to willingly join with others in the pursuit of truth. I.F. Stone, in his book titled The Trial of Socrates, explores this statement even further and acknowledges that Socrates assisted in his own demise by insulting his accusers and the court. He notes: But Socrates, in dealing with the question what is knowledge? went off in an opposite direction. Real knowledge, Socrates taught, could be obtained only through absolute definition. If one could not define a thing absolutely, then one really didnt know what it was. Then Socrates demonstrated that such knowledge was unobtainable, even by him. Modestly, he claimed that, in this sense, all he knew was that he didnt know. Virtue was knowledge, but real knowledge was inaccessible. Even this much of the truth could be grasped only, if at all, by a few. So behind his immeasurable modesty there lurked an equally immeasurable conceit. (Stone, 39-40)

Ward 5 Socrates conceit is brash, but poignant in his address to the court regarding his reputation as being wise. Stone further writes: In Platos Apology, Socrates says the oracle was asked an enigmatic question and gave an enigmatic answer, or at least Socrates chose to treat it as such. The question was whether there were anyone wiser than I. The answer was that there was no one wiser. Platos version differs in grace and whimsicality, or irony, but not in substance from Xenophons. In Plato, Socrates puts the story diffidently, as if to disarm the court. He asks the jurors not to make a tumultusing the same Greek verb, thorubeo, as does the Xenophonic account- if I seem to you to be boasting (which of course he was). Socrates is apologetic that such a question was even asked the oracleand blames this on Chaerephon, the disciple who dared broach it [] So blame for the boastfulness is shifted to Chaerephon. [] Why should a reputation for wisdom get a man into trouble in a city like Athens, a city to which philosophers flocked from all over Greece and were not welcomed but richly rewarded as teachers and popular lecturers? [] The answer seems to be that Socrates used his special kind of wisdom- his sophia or skill as a logician and philosopher- for a special political purpose: to make all the leading men of the city appear to be ignorant fools. (Stone, 79-81) In Platonic dialogue, Socrates admits this himself and defends the accusation of impiety against him by stating:

Ward 6 This inquisition has led to my having many enemies of the worst and most dangerous kind, and has given occasion also to many calumnies. And I am called wise, for my hearers always imagine that I myself possess the wisdom which I find wanting in others: but the truth is, O men of Athens, that God only is wise; and by his answer he intends to show that the wisdom of men is worth little or nothing; he is not speaking of Socrates, he is only using my name by way of illustration, as if he said, He, O men, is the wisest, who, like Socrates, knows that his wisdom is in truth worth nothing. And so I go about the world, obedient to the God, and search and make inquiry into the wisdom of any one, whether citizen or stranger, who appears to be wise; and if he is not wise, then in vindication of the oracle I show him that he is not wise; and my occupation quite absorbs me, and I have no time to give either to any public matter of interest or to any concern of my own, but I am in utter poverty by reason of my devotion to the God. (Stumpf, 15) Socrates spars with his accusers in this manner throughout Platos Apology, making a mockery of all and demonstrating his unwillingness to compromise his ethics for the good of the court or their perceived accusations. He placed a valued emphasis on Athenian law, regardless of his own convictions and saw it as his duty to uphold such. Stone submits that: Socrates was sensitive to the charge that he had always stood apart from the political life of the city. At his trial- according to Platos Apology- he cited two instances of participation in politics, once against the democracy, once against the dictatorship of the Thirty. These were, by his own account, the only occasions on

Ward 7 which he took an active part in the affairs of his city. In both cases participation was forced upon him under circumstances not of his own free choice. But when confronted by the duty, he acted justly and with courage. The first occasion, in 406 B.C. came during the trial of the generals who had commanded the Athenian fleet at the battle of Arginusae. They were accused of failing to pick up survivors and the bodies of the dead after the battle. The generals claimed that rescue was made impossible by stormy seas. Socrates was a member of the prytaneis, the board of fifty that presided at the trial. These were chosen by lot. The issue which put Socrates mettle to the test was whether the generals had the right to be tried separately. To try them together was manifestly unfair. Each individual commander had a right to be judged on the basis of what he himself actually had done under the specific circumstances in the area of his responsibility. The Athenian boule, or council, in preparing the case for trial by the assembly, had given into public indignation against the generals and decided that they were to be tried together. But when the trial opened before the assembly, a resolute dissenter challenged the mass trial as invalid under established Athenian law and procedure.[] Socrates alone held out to the last against this illegal and unjust procedure. The second occasion on which Socrates was compelled to confront his duty as a citizen involved a wealthy metic, or resident alien, Leon of Salamis, under the rule of the Thirty. So narrow was the public support for the dictatorship that it

Ward 8 could hope to survive only through the intimidating presence in Athens of a Spartan garrison. To pay the expenses of the garrison, it proceeded to liquidate rich resident noncitizen traders, and then expropriate their estates to pay the Spartan occupiers. After the oligarchy was established, Socrates tells his judges in Platos Apology, the Thirty sent for me with four others to come to the rotunda and ordered us to bring Leon the Salaminianto be put to death. The thirty did not need citizens posse for the arrest. The thirty had bullyboy squads with whips and daggers to terrorize the citizenry. These could have easily arrested Leon. Why did they want Socrates to take part? They gave many such orders to others also, Socrates explains, because they wished to implicate as many in their crimes as they could. [] Socrates resisted, but minimally, not so much as a political but as a private act. Instead of protesting the order, he simply left the rotunda and quietly went home, and took no part in the arrest. This, when stripped of his boastfulness, was the substance of his own account. Then I, however, showed again, by action, Socrates says, not in word only, that I do not care a whit for death if that be not to do anything unjust or unholy. For that government, with all its power, did not frighten me into doing anything unjust, but when we came out of the rotunda, the other four wentand arrested Leon, but I simply went home (Stone, 111-113)

Ward 9 In both cases, whether challenging or passive, Socrates made a courageous attempt to preserve and reaffirm his commitment and respect for the laws as they were applied. On defending his course in life, Socrates states in the Apology: Someone will say: And are you not ashamed, Socrates, of a course of life which is likely to bring you an untimely end? To him I may fairly answer: There you are mistaken: a man who is good for anything ought not to calculate the chance of living or dying; he ought only to consider whether in doing anything he is doing right or wrong- acting the part of a good man or of a bad.[] If now, when, as I conceive and imagine, God orders me to fulfill the philosophers mission of searching into myself and other men, I were to desert my post through fear of death, or any other fear; that would indeed be strange, and I might justly be arraigned in court for denying the existence of the gods, if I disobeyed the oracle because I was afraid of death, fancying that I was wise when I was not wise. For the fear of death is indeed the pretence of wisdom, and not real wisdom, being a pretence of knowing the unknown; and no one knows whether death, which men in their fear apprehend to be the greatest evil, may not be the greatest good. Is not this ignorance of a disgraceful sort, the ignorance which is the conceit that a man knows what he does not know? And in this respect only I believe myself to differ from men in general, and may perhaps claim to be wiser than they are:-that whereas I know but little of the world below, I do not suppose that I know: but I do know that injustice and disobedience to a better, whether God or man, is evil

Ward 10 and dishonorable, and I will never fear or avoid a possible good rather than a certain evil. (Stumpf, 20) His ultimate surrender to Athenian law and his guilty verdict is echoed in his statement: I tell you that to do as you say would be a disobedience to the God,[] and if I say again that daily to discourse about virtue, and of those other things about which you hear me examining myself and others, is the greatest good of man, and that the unexamined life is not worth living you are still less likely to believe me. [] Wherefore, O judges, be of good cheer about death, and know of a certainty, that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death. (Stumpf, 2629)

With history having the propensity to repeat itself, we move to a more modern time frame. Martin Luther King, Jr. has long been portrayed as a man with vision and passionate commitment for the civil rights movement in America. Michael Eric Dyson, in his novel titled, I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr., addresses Kings background by writing: He drank from the roots of black sacred rhetoric within his own genealogical treehe was the son, grandson, and great-grandson of Baptist preachers- and from legendary figures who branched into his youthful world, including William Holmes Borders, Sandy Ray, and Gardner Taylor, who is widely viewed as Kings preaching idol and the poet laureate of the American pulpit. Before King

Ward 11 was baptized in the waters of liberal white theological education, he drew deep from the well of wisdom contained in the words of his church elders. King also learned the art of masking hard truth in humor. He learned how to dress cultural observation in colorful cadences of tuneful speech[] King learned to weave penetrating and eloquent liberation stories by threading into his sermons extensive allusion to the Bible and keen political and social analysis. (Dyson, 179) Cornel West further corroborates this in his essay The Religious Foundations of the Thought of Martin Luther King, Jr. by noting that King was driven by four principal intellectual and existential sources. He quotes them as being: The prophetic black church tradition that initially and fundamentally shaped his world view. The second was a prophetic liberal Christianity that he encountered in his higher education and scholarly training. The third was a prophetic Gandhian method of nonviolent social change that he first heard about in a sermon by Mordecai Johnson, then President of Howard University, and that he utilized in his intense intellectual struggle with the powerful critiques of Christianity and the Christian love ethic put forward by Carl Marx and Frederich Nietzche. The last source was that of prophetic American civil religion, which fuses secular and sacred history and combines Christian themes of deliverance and salvation with political ideals of democracy, freedom, and equality. (West, 116) King utilized his charisma and influences in sermons and political rhetoric to produce emotional responses in his audiences that resound even today. Being a prominent leader in the

Ward 12 Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), he was invited to participate in the fight for civil rights in Birmingham, Alabama, where an SCLC meeting was to be held. King was arrested as a result of a program of sit-ins at luncheon counters and wrote his now famous Letter From A Birmingham Jail as a response to a group of clergymen who had publicly criticized his position. In 1963 many people to whom King addressed this letter firmly believed that peace and order might be threatened by granting African Americans the true independence that King insisted were their rights and guaranteed under the Constitution of the United States. Eventually the causes that King promoted were victorious. His efforts helped to change attitudes in the South and spur legislation that has been beneficial to all Americans. His views with regard to nonviolence spread throughout the whole world, and by the early 1960s he had become famous as a man who stood for human rights and human dignity virtually everywhere. Martin Luther King, Jr. was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 for these efforts. Although King himself was nonviolent, his program left both him and his followers open to the threat of violence. The sit-ins and voter registration programs spurred countless bombings, threats, and murders by members of the white community. Kings life was often threatened, his home bombed, and his followers harassed. He was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968. But before he died he saw- largely through his own efforts, influence, and example- the face of America change. In Kings letter, he responds systematically to his accusers his reasons for coming to Birmingham and the struggles that face not only him, but also our nation itself at the time. He argues:

Ward 13 I think I should indicate why I am here in Birmingham, since you have been influenced by the view which argues against outsiders coming in. I have the honor as serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia. [] Several months ago the affiliate here in Birmingham asked us to be on call to engage in a nonviolent direction program if such were deemed necessary. [] More basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. (King, 50-51) Like Socrates before him, he criticizes his accusers for not taking a more proactive role in accepting his own cause and places the blame for his actions on those of the white community by noting: You deplore the demonstrations taking place in Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say, fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations. I am sure that none of you would want to rest content with the superficial kind of social analysis that deals merely with effects and does not grapple with underlying causes. (King, 51-52) King outlines the steps taken by his associates in negotiation processes with the city leaders, only to be stalled and rejected. He reinforces this by stating, Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. (King, 53). He utilizes Socrates metaphor of a gadfly in Platos Apology as a means of prompting men to rise from the depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood. (King, 54). King recounts

Ward 14 throughout history how men have fought to secure such freedoms with the use of both violent and nonviolent means. He quotes St. Thomas Aquinas definition of an unjust law, A human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. (King, 57), and then redefines it more concretely. An unjust law is a code inflicted upon a minority which that minority had no part in enacting or creating because it did not have the unhampered right to vote. (King, 57). This is where Socrates and Martin Luther King, Jr. differ somewhat in their opinions. Socrates would advocate strict adherence to the law, whereas King writes: One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law. (King, 58) Eloquently citing scripture and historical accounts, Kings defiant rebuttal to his accusers places him at the forefront of his nonviolent movement by noting, I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the dimension of nonviolence entered our struggle. (King, 61). In his closing, King laments his accusers for commending the Birmingham police force for keeping order and preventing violence. He states: I wish you had commended the Negro demonstrators for their sublime courage, their willingness to suffer, and their amazing discipline in the midst of the most inhuman provocation. One day the south will recognize its real heroes. They will

Ward 15 be the James Merediths, with the noble sense of purpose that enables them to face jeering and hostile mobs, and with the agonizing loneliness that characterizes the life of the pioneer. They will be the old oppressed, battered Negro woman in Montgomery, Alabama, who rose up with a sense of dignity and with her people decided not to ride segregated buses, and who responded with ungrammatical profundity to one who inquired about her weariness: My feets is tired, but my soul is at rest. They will be the young high school and college students, the young ministers of the gospel and a host of their elders, courageously and nonviolently sitting at lunch counters and willingly going to jail for consciences sake. (King, 67) Whereas Socrates was given credit as being one of the first great philosophers to begin seeking the moral character of man, he spent the predominant part of his time in pursuit of precisely that, merely frustrating his peers and making them feel foolish or ignorant. Martin Luther King, Jr. changed the social structure of an entire nation. Through his nonviolent efforts and struggles, he has been noted in the annals of history as being one of the most prominent and influential characters of our time with respect to human rights. His promotion of the Gandhian philosophy of nonviolent protest has been a tactic utilized in movements worldwide. Although some regarded him as a womanizer, he has been able to surpass that stigma and stay true to his beliefs, thus garnering my respect as the more pro-active of the two.

Ward 16 Works Cited Dyson, Michael Eric, I May Not Get There With You: The True Martin Luther King, Jr., Copyright 2002 by Michael Eric Dyson, Published by Simon & Schuster. King, Martin Luther, Letter From A Birmingham Jail, excerpted from The Eloquent Essay, John Loughery, editor, Copyright 2000 by John Loughery, Published by Persea Books. Smith, Lacy Baldwin, Fools, Martyrs, Traitors: The Story of Martyrdom in the Western World, Copyright 1997 by Lacy baldwin Smith, Published by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Stone, Isidor F., The Trial of Socrates, Copyright 1989 by I.F. Stone, Published by Anchor Books (Doubleday). Stumpf, Samuel Enoch and James Fieser, editors, Philosophy: History and problems. 6th ed. Published by McGraw-Hill. West, Cornel, The Religious Foundations of the Thought of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Black Freedom Struggle, Peter J. Albert and Ronald Hoffman, editors, Copyright 1990 by Random House, Inc.