With the truth have We sent it down
And with the truth has it descended
And We did not send you, except as
A bearer of good news and as warner
The Holy Quran, 17:105.
Abstract
Everybody acknowledges the importance of Socrates’ role and influence on the history of philosophy, as well as on the culture of humanity. He is also considered to be the first martyr of virtue and wisdom in human history. In spite of this, even though most Western commentators recognize the elevated meanings and high level of Socratic wisdom, they refuse to consider it to have a supra-human source and to be divine prophecy. In this article and through the analysis of Socrates’ words and speeches, which can be found in authentic sources such as some of Plato’s writings, the author aims to prove the truth of Socrates’ claim according to which he had the gift of prophecy. By putting together rational proofs and historical clues from his life, we will underline the veracity of such a claim. A part of the article will be dedicated to underlining the fact that our reasoning is based on authentic and historical references of Socrates’ speeches, which are mainly mentioned in Plato’s Apology. By quoting the main and most important commentators’ views in this field, we will therefore endeavor to show that there is a sort of general consensus among most commentators to consider this treatise to be an historical document. The importance as well as main outcome of this article is that if we accept this theory, the general outlook of the history of philosophy will change radically. In addition, the claim that wisdom has a divine source, which is mentioned repeatedly in the content of divine wise men’s words and in some Islamic traditions, will be confirmed. Moreover, the link between spiritual truths and human reasoning will be corroborated and underlined.
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Notes
In Islam, the notion of miracle has a highly rational content, since the highest miracle establishing the veracity of the prophecy is considered to be a book, the Quran. This is why some Quranic verses challenge those who do not believe in the divine content of this book to formulate a surah like the Quran: ‘And if you are in doubt about what We have sent down upon Our Servant [Muhammad], then produce a surah the like thereof and call upon your witnesses other that Allah, if you should be truthful’ (2 : 23) (Shakir’ translation). This does not mean that the prophet of Islam never performed any sensitive miracles, but he never used them as a proof of his prophecy.
The fact that the prophet is being sent by God is clearly expressed in the Old Testament, notably concerning Moses, Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezechiel (Exod. 3: 13; Isa. 6: 8 ; Jer. 1: 7; Ezek. 2: 3).
All the Quranic verse translations are from Shakir.
It is what Heidegger means when he writes: ‘the great begins great, maintains itself only through the free recurrence of greatness within it, and if it is great ends also in greatness. So it is with the philosophy of the Greeks. It ended in greatness with Aristotle’ (Heidegger Martin, An introduction to Metaphysics, p. 15).
Essents means existents. See translator’s footnote in An Introduction to Metaphysics, p. 1 ‘Essents=existents, things that are.’
However, we disagree with Heidegger’s opinion on three matters: firstly, his interpretation of Presocratic philosophy, which is based on the assertion that this philosophy is based on the direct expression of the very reality of Being itself, i.e., the Being of beings (especially in Parmenides and Heraclites’ philosophies). According to Heidegger, this golden age of philosophy ended with Plato and Socrates whose thought marks the beginning of a decline of the ontological importance of the question of Being, which is to say the beginning of conceptual thought on beings or essents instead of the Being of beings. We believe that even though such an interpretation in partly true, it confuses philosophy and gnosis. In our opinion, what Heidegger considers to be the aim of philosophy, which is to say Being of beings, means a direct and Gnostic apprehension of existence that can only be realized through direct contemplation and not by conceptual philosophical thought. Thus, the thought of Pre-Socratic philosophers such as Parmenides stems from an inner revelation and is closer to gnosis than philosophical thought. In fact, the ‘Being of beings’ of Heidegger exactly corresponds to the ‘a priori unconditioned being’ (wujûd lâ beshart-e maqsami), which is the subject of Islamic speculative gnosis and corresponds to the reality of existence without any determination or condition, not even the condition of not having been conditioned and determined, and concerns direct and Gnostic apprehension of existence. However, if we want to express any kind of speculative thinking and demonstration of this subject, this only possible way is philosophy through its subject defined as ‘being qua being’ and the use of conceptual demonstrations.
On this subject, refer to Guthrie, W. K. C., A History of Greek Philosophy, vol. IV. Sect. III. ‘The Dialogues’, 2, Chronology, pp. 39–66; ‘Early Socratic dialogues,’ pp. 67–101 and to Taylor, A. E., Plato, the Man and his Work, Chap. II, pp. 10–22.
As an example, Vlastos writes that ‘Socrates makes a parallel move: he rationalizes the gods by making them moral’ (Vlastos, Socrates, p. 162).
The Quran speaks of these prophets as ‘messengers of inflexible purpose’ (ulu al-'azm): ‘Therefore patiently persevere, as did (all) messengers of inflexible purpose’ (46: 35). Their names are mentioned in this verse: ‘And remember We took from the prophets their covenant: as (We did) from thee: from Noah, Abraham, Moses, and Jesus the son of Mary: We took a solemn covenant’ (33 : 7). Therefore, according to the Quran, there are only five prophets to whom a divine law has been revealed.
This Quranic verse alludes to this subject: ‘They said: These [Moses and Aaron] are most surely two magicians who wish to turn you out from your land by their magic and to take your best traditions’ (20 : 63).
In the end, it is interesting to mention that Shia people have a custom when they want to consult God on a special issue: they concentrate and then open the Quran randomly to find an answer to their request. This practice is called ‘estekhâreh.’ I therefore used this practice to consult with God on the issue of Socrates’ prophecy and after formulating my intention and concentration, I opened the Holy Quran and the verse that appeared at the beginning of this article was on the top right corner of the page—something confirming the divine prophecy of Socrates: ‘With the truth have We sent it down/And with the truth has it descended/And we did not send you, except as/A bearer of good news and as warner’ (The Holy Quran, 17:105).
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Acknowledgement
I would like to thank my assistant Amélie Neuve-Eglise, who helped me to find the main sources for this paper.
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Ghaffari, H. Is Socrates a Prophet? (In Light of the Views of His Contemporaries and the Main Commentators). SOPHIA 50, 391–411 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11841-011-0266-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11841-011-0266-0