Abstract

JL his paper calls into question a conventional way of reading the passage concerning knowledge and belief at the end of book 5 of Plato's Republic. On the conventional reading, Plato is committed to arguing on grounds that his philosophical opponents would accept, but this view fails to appreciate the rhetorical context in which the passage is situated. Indeed, it is not usually recognized or considered important that the passage has a rhetorical context at all. Philoso phers typically reduce the questions asked by Socrates and the an swers given by Glaucon in the presence of a large audience, to one continuous argument of Plato's. Unfortunately, this way of reading book 5 ignores two points that are crucial to its interpretation: (1) the Socrates-Glaucon dialectic is directed to hostile (not merely intel lectually opposed) interlocutors, and (2) the relation between Socra tes and his audience (Glaucon excepted) is one of antagonism.1 I shall argue that scholars have for a long time been trying to find more philosophical fruit in the passage than it has to bear, largely because they have misconstrued its role in the argument of the Re public.