How can Plato's "Allegory of the Cave" be used to help understand "Euthyphro?"

            I chose this form of the question assuming the shorter story would help unlock the lengthier one. Normally an allegory is filled with symbols that have meaning on a higher level, so despite its shortness may be more complex. However, after Socrates tells his story about the prisoner in the cave, he is helpful enough to explain how we should interpret the objects, and events, to understand Plato's view of the structure of reality, the relationship between the philosopher and society, the stages of enlightenment, and the questioning nature and doubts that are features of the philosophical temperament.

            For Plato, two realms of reality exist. The lower level, he symbolizes by the world of the cave. But there is a higher realm symbolized by the world outside the cave. Say you are the prisoner and witnessed the fire, then extinguished it. It has changed. But the burning fire was a symbol for fire itself; the idea of fire in your mind was not erased. There are two "fires". One which you see, touch, taste, feel, and smell, is part of the lower, changing realm. The other is unchanging, the idea of fire that is different from the physical symbol of fire you just put out. Plato called these ideas "forms". If you and all sentient beings died, the idea, or form, of fire, would still exist in the higher, nonphysical realm of reality. Everything you know with your senses are copies of forms. Plato's symbols for these imperfect copies were the shadows of the objects behind the prisoners. To be enlightened is to escape from the lower world of the cave (the world of the senses), and ascend into a higher, unchanging realm of the perfect forms. The highest form was the Form of the Good. Symbolized by the sun, the Good was the last thing seen by the prisoner, and the most difficult to see. Furthermore, just as the sun was experienced as the source of warmth and light, the Good is to be seen as the source of reality and truth.

            In Allegory, Socrates observed that the enlightened are compelled to "dispute about the shadows of justice or the images that cast those shadows, and to wrangle over the notions of what is right in the minds of men who have never beheld Justice itself." In Euthyphro, Plato is putting the people of Athens on trial, to convince them of their ignorance in the very matter which Socrates is accused. Socrates is confident that by bringing charges against his father, Euthyphro is sure that what he is doing is pious, or holy. Socrates assumes that there is one essential nature of piety that includes whatever is pious, and asks Euthyphro what that might be. Before Euthyphro even tries to give any definition of piety, he appears to be in the "conjecturing" stage. He cannot tell the difference between the "image" of piety and the real thing. He just accepts current moral notions (of classical Greek mythology) at face value.

            Euthyphro supports the first of his many definitions, "Piety is doing as I am doing," by citing when Zeus punishes his father, Cronos, for eating his children. This answer is not in a proper form; Euthyphro gives an ostensive definition (pointing to himself and naming his behavior "pious") instead of the underlying, or as Socrates would say, "general" idea, that makes pious acts pious. There are many acts of piety not covered by his example. This is akin to saying that unchaining a cave prisoner and letting him turn from shadows of puppets to look at the puppets gives him genuine knowledge.

            Euthyphro offers his second definition when he proclaims, "Piety is that which is dear to the gods." Euthyphro soon admits that there is a likelihood of disagreement among the gods, the kind of differences of opinion which give rise to quarrels. The definition leaves open the possibility that the same act might be both pious (dear to some gods) and impious (hated by others), and thus leads to a contradiction.

            Euthyphro's third definition is a modification of the previous one: "What all the gods love is pious," specifically, regarding the propriety of punishing a murderer. Socrates actually suggests this as a definition, then asks if an act is loved by the gods because it is inherently pious, or, an act is pious because the gods see it fit to be loved. Socrates has set up the question so that only one option fits. Euthyphro admits that the gods love an act because it is pious. But, the gods' loving an act does not make it pious. Thus Euthyphro's definition is really only a characteristic of piety, not its definition.

            The passages from 10b to 11b are very difficult for me on several levels. First, I'm facing a self-contradiction. I want to establish Socrates' statement that (A) piety "is loved because it is holy." and (B) piety "is not holy because it is loved." Suppose we know that (D) "Piety is loved by the gods," to be a true statement. Likewise, we assume (A) and the negation of (B) to be true. Socrates showed that (C) piety is loved by the gods because it is loved by the gods. This follows from claim (A) and Euthyphro's definition of piety by substituting "loved by the gods" for piety in (A). But (C) is the negation of (B). Our supposition that piety is loved by the gods must be false after all. Reductio ad absurdum!

            Second, we should be able to substitute the word "piety" with its definition. So we end up with something like (C), which poses an impossibility. If the gods really think that a act is pious and therefore recognized as pious, then it has to be pious independent of them regarding it and cannot therefore be pious because it looks pious to the gods. On the other hand, if we take the other option and say that an act becomes pious by being loved by the gods, then that act cannot be pious because it is pious; it only gets to be pious as a result of their loving it. We end up describing an effect: piety is having something happen to it. In any case, accepting either the gods' perception (or their attitude) merely reveals that perception or attitude; it doesn't provide a definition. Thirdly, the existence of "general" idea that makes all pious things pious must precede the attitude of the gods (or the perception of humans). Neither can be the source of the general idea that has to precede them. The second option, therefore, cannot work even if Euthyphro were to select it as an avenue of definition. So "loved by all the gods" is not a definition at all.

            The Allegory is a section of The Republic, which attempts to define the word "justice". In Euthyphro, Socrates asks whether piety is a part of justice, or justice a part of piety. Euthyphro agrees that piety is a part of justice. Socrates has led the conversation toward a more universal idea, justice, which includes the notion of piety. Euthyphro, now trying for a fourth time, defines "Piety ... to be that part of justice which attends to the gods." Socrates asks what he means by "attention." He adds that attention usually benefits that which gets the attention. It is absurd to say we are being pious to benefit the gods. Euthyphro explains that the attention is like ministration to the gods. Socrates then points out that ministration to someone usually means assisting him in his work. He asks what ministration to the gods helps them to do-apparently, not much.

            Euthyphro asserts his fifth definition: "Piety . . . is learning how to please the gods by prayers and sacrifices." Socrates interprets this as a "art which gods and men have of doing business with one another," and asks what benefit the gods get from gifts. Euthyphro answers that they are pleased, not benefited. Now we return to two earlier definitions, that "piety is that which is dear to the gods." At this point, Euthyphro finds an excuse to leave, and the discussion ends.

            Acknowledgment of ignorance is seems to be the goal in Euthyphro, maybe to clear the mind for higher knowledge. Who knows, maybe Euthyphro did?