The Other of the Other: Seth Benardete’s View of Socrates

Following in the footsteps of his teacher Leo Strauss, Seth Benardete devoted his life to understanding "the problem of Socrates": Plato's complex and enigmatic portrayal of the ironic Socrates' embodiment of the philosophic life. This paper introduces Benardete's rich and dense interpretive work by focusing on his understanding of two of Socrates' most distinctive characteristics: his daimonion and his eros. Like Strauss, Benardete reads Plato's dialogues as a response to Aristophanes' fundamental but friendly critique of Socrates in the Clouds. In this context, the daimonion and eros emerge as the manifestation of Socrates' self-knowledge, and thus of political philosophy as the "eccentric core" of philosophy. Guided by Plato, Benardete subsequently moves beyond the "quarrel between poetry and philosophy" to trace the Socratic turn and the origins of political philosophy all the way back to Homer.