Plato: Good, Light, the Divided Line, and the Cave

The three most famous allegories in the Republic, the line, light and the Cave, as an elaboration of the Good.

These are in the Republic book VI 504d–520 (eleven pages of dialogue.)

Republic 504d: Socrates speaks of the “greatest subject” — not virtue, not justice, not wisdom themselves. Glaucon assumes these must be the greatest, but Socrates surprises him: “No, there is something greater still.” And this is, of course, the Good.

The Form of the Good is the supreme principle. It is that by which justice and wisdom and all the other Forms become useful and beneficial. The Good is the source of knowledge, of intelligibility, and therefore of reality itself.

Here is a link to the notes for this meeting.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/12MgByhPsHf5YvOro6FYFgQ445COr_TBh/edit?usp=drive_link&ouid=117509398413484629402&rtpof=true&sd=true

Here is a link to the copy of all Plato's works.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Xh7jrEn06i1lWiG2qlN056Eg0a7aGoo6/view?usp=drive_link

Socrates cannot tell us what the good is:
506-D E I'm afraid I won't be up to it. Disgrace myself and look ridiculous by trying. So, let's abandoned the quest for what the good itself is for the time being. And then he says couple lines down. I'm willing to tell you about what it is, what is apparently an offspring of the good and most like it.
This is yet another case where he says I'm going to give you an image. And of course, that image is the sun.

The Analogy to the Good (508a–509b)
Socrates now makes the crucial step:

• The Sun is to sight and visible things as the Good is to intellect and intelligible things.
• The Sun is not sight itself, but the cause of sight and of visibility.
• The Good is not knowledge itself, but the cause of knowledge and truth.

After this we will discuss the Divided Line and the Cave.

Hope to see you there,

Richard