The One Year Delay
There was a delay between the time when Socrates was condemned to death and when Socrates dies. This delay is explained through a use of imagery in early on in Phaedo.
“Theseus went to Crete when he took with him the fourteen youths…they were said to have vowed to Apollo at the time, that if they were saved they would send a yearly mission to Delos…beginning when the priest of Apollo crowns the stern of the ship, is a holy season, during which the city is not allowed to be polluted by public executions; and when the vessel is detained by contrary winds, the time spent in going and returning is very considerable. As I was saying, the ship was crowned on the day before the trial, and this was the reason why Socrates lay in prison and was not put to death until long after he was condemned.”
Euthyphro’s Suit
The question at hand is what is piety. Euthyphro informs Socrates that what distinguishes himself from other men is exact knowledge of this subject. In fact, it is his knowledge of the difference that sets him apart from other men. That is why he is prosecuting his own father for murder. The murder details of the murder provided in the form of narrative imagery:
“one day in a fit of drunken passion he got into a quarrel with one of our domestic servants and slew him. My father bound him hand and foot and threw him into a ditch, and then sent to Athens to ask of a diviner what he should do with him. Meanwhile he never attended to him and took no care about him, for he regarded him as a murderer; and thought that no great harm would be done even if he did die. Now this was just what happened. For such was the effect of cold and hunger and chains upon him, that before the messenger returned from the diviner, he was dead.”
Submission
Socrates puts forth a rather ironic and seemingly paradoxical argument for his submitting to the will of the Athenians to put him to death despite thinking that it is an unjust punishment for an unjust criminal offense. It is essentially the same justification that parents often give to their children for obeying family rules, except it is as if the child was explaining justifying the rules in this case:
…they will say, "Of all Athenians you have been the most constant resident in the city...you never went out of the city either to see the games, except once when you went to the Isthmus, or to any other place unless when you were on military service; nor did you travel as other men do. Nor had you any curiosity to know other states or their laws…you might in the course of the trial, if you had liked, have fixed the penalty at banishment; the state which refuses to let you go now would have let you go then…now you have forgotten these fine sentiments, and pay no respect to us the laws, of whom you are the destroyer”
Bee Story
The title character of Meno asks Socrates whether virtue can be learned which commences a dialogue on the nature of virtue. It is somewhat like the question of what is piety, of course, in that the ultimate lesson which Socrates tries to teach is about universality. Virtue is a word denoting a concept, but still just a singular word, therefore its definition should apply to all instances regardless of individual circumstances. The first demonstration of this concept which Socrates uses to get his point across involves bee imagery:
“How fortunate I am, Meno! When I ask you for one virtue, you present me with a swarm of them which are in your keeping. Suppose that I carry on the figure of the swarm, and ask of you, What is the nature of the bee? and you answer that there are many kinds of bees, and I reply: But do bees differ as bees, because there are many and different kinds of them; or are they not rather to be distinguished by some other quality, as for example beauty, size, or shape? How would you answer me?”
Meno, in the unfortunate role of the other party in a dialogue with Socrates, immediately proves himself quite the obtuse drone in utterly missing the point Socrates is trying to make: “I should answer that bees do not differ from one another, as bees.”
