Abstract

The question of the relation between the soul and the polis, in the same way as other questions that Plato discusses in his dialogue The Republic, can only be adequately comprehended from the point of view of the central question of the whole work – the question of justice. This question relates to the problem of the intrinsic relation between an individual, the soul and life. The benefit and the profit of a just life exist neither in the preservation and expansion of power nor in an increase of material wealth but rather in the genuine realization of the individual’s nature from and in the contact with that which is incomparably bigger than man – the totality of what there is and exists. The justice of the soul and the truth of life realised in it are realized, so to speak, are nothing but the very “superhuman” state of being of an individual human, the significance of which lies in the fact that the essential Being of the individual is actually the Being and realization of the soul as his essence. The role of the polis in this context is not incidental; only because of that can the question of justice in general be correctly formulated, on the presumption of a connection between the individual, the polis and the soul. A person attains his essential Being in the justice of the polis.