Abstract

This essay compares how Hannah Arendt and Leo Strauss interpret the allegory of the cave in Plato's Republic. Such a comparison helps resolve two ambiguities in the scholarship on Arendt and Strauss. First, Arendt is ambiguous about the origins of the tradition of political philosophy that, she argues, distorts the authentic experience of philosophy and politics. I contend that a theme typically associated with Strauss, esotericism, appears in Arendt and helps resolve this ambiguity. In an esoteric reading of Plato's allegory of the cave, Arendt argues that Plato constructs the allegory of the cave to teach a lesson that would make the political situation of the philosopher less precarious. This initiates the formidable tradition of political philosophy. The tradition's prejudice in favour of the vita contemplativa over the vita activa originates with Plato's politics. Arendt exposes Plato's esotericism in order to retrieve a purer understanding of philosophy and politics from Platonism's distortions. Second, Strauss is ambiguous toward metaphysics. Strauss expresses this ambiguity in his interpretation of the allegory of the cave, as well as in his treatment of Plato's doctrine of the ideas. Yet a tendency in Strauss scholarship, as well as in Straussian studies of Plato, is to conclude that Strauss aims for a non-metaphysical recovery of Platonic philosophy, where the priority is to resolve the precarious political situation of the philosopher vis-à-vis the city. This interpretation holds that for Strauss, the allegory of the cave and the doctrine of ideas are primarily about political themes. I argue that Arendt's interpretation diverges from Strauss precisely on the emphasis of political themes. It is Arendt, not Strauss, who emphasises political themes. It is Arendt, not Strauss, who primarily interprets the doctrine of the ideas as Plato's solution to the precarious political situation of the philosopher vis-àvis the city. Showing where Arendt and Strauss diverge on these points deepens our understanding of Strauss. Strauss's interpretation stresses the presuppositions behind the form of questioning that the doctrine of ideas takes. Strauss cannot be characterised as a simply non-metaphysical thinker concerned with the precarious political situation of the philosopher, because his own interpretation of Plato's doctrine of the ideas and the allegory of the cave ultimately raise the question of what nature is.