Aristophanes's View Of Love

Our human nature was not what we always thought of it to be, in simpler times two were made as one. We roamed the earth in unity with our other halves without the burden of trying to find them. However, Zeus did not find this to be in his best interest because of how we behaved so he split each being in two. As a result of this split we must now go about our lives in search of our other half. This is the speech that Aristophanes gave in Plato’s Symposium a book composed of various speeches from many different famous Greek people. Aristophanes’ view of love is compelling because it describes our very human nature to find our love, it justifies the reasoning of why there are different sexualities, and it gives an explanation as to why our bodies are the way that they are today.

According to Aristophanes, love (eros) – the highest form of love that one human being can feel towards another – is the desire of dissected halves, one to another, for restoring the wholeness of the nature’s origin. I will explain what does Aristophanes mean by his metaphor and why do people fall in love.

Symposium is a gathering hosted by Agaton to celebrate his first tragedy award for playwriting. Each of the guests gave a speech about love. The speech dealing with questions about what is love; interpersonal relationships through love; what types of love are worthy of praise; the purpose of love; and others. A series of speech about the love ended by the entry of Alcibiades, known as a wealthy aristocrat of Athens for his good-looking, and political career. He entered the discussion drunkenly supporting by a flute-girl, follow upon his speech about love. His unexpected entrance and speech dramatically changed the mood left from Diotima’s serious dialogue with Socrates about the ideal love. The first five speeches contradicted each other and were reconciled in Diotima’s speech, especially her speech about “Ladder if love” and “love of wisdom ”, which implies the delicate relationship between Alcibiades and Socrates.

Plato was a student of Socrates and a teacher of Aristotle. Together, these three men are regarded as the founders of Western philosophy. Plato dedicated his life to helping people reach fulfillment. He established the Academy of Athens. He is often commended for allowing his ideas to be open to interpretation. Among Plato’s popular theories:

Plato (428-7 B.C.E - 348-7 B.C.E) was a well-known ancient Greek philosopher, a student of Socartes, teacher of Aristotle, and founder of the Academy. Plato came from one of the wealthiest and most politically involved families in all of Athens. His mother is believed to be related to Solon, the Greek statesman in 6th century B.C.E. His father is related to the kings of Messenia and Athens. After the death of Socrates in 399 B.C.E, Plato began studying mathematics, geometry, geology, astronomy and religion in Egypt, which is where he began his writing. During his travelling period of 399-387 B.C.E he wrote the Apology of Socrates, Protagoras, Euthyphro, Hippias Major and Minor and Ion, in which he writes about Socartes’ teaching

The main topic of Plato’s Symposium is the question “what is love”. It is a record of six speeches by different academics that all tell a story and use verse to express a lot of varying stories and themes about the nature and function of love (eros). In the Theaetetus, Socrates explores three definitions of what knowledge is and each of these

In Symposium by Plato, a group of men gather around to seek one’s full understanding of the underestimated reasons of Love. Despite having different occupations, they all seem to agree on their views of love except for Socrates. Socrates communicates that Love is a god, and then decides to add that he came to his conclusion with the help of a woman named Diotima. Although their views of love are similar, they are also different and can be seen through another philosopher’s stories; Antigone and Oedipus. Socrates’ definition of love is characterized by Oedipus the King and Diotima’s definition of love is characterized by Antigone. Socrates’ understanding of love is that love is a desire to be conscious of what you need for something you do not have and for what you have because once you have it you will not feel the need to want it anymore; love is also a display of what you already have and are afraid to lose forever. Diotima’s understanding of Love is that Love is not a god, love is a demi-god. Because, he is a demi-god, he is in between wisdom and ignorance.

-Plato depicts an infamous dinner party, where several profound figures analyze love and two speeches in particular are significant.

Plato was a philosopher from Classical Greece and an innovator of dialogue and dialect forms which provide some of the earliest existing analysis ' of political questions from a philosophical perspective. Among some of Plato 's most prevalent works is his dialogue the Symposium, which records the conversation of a dinner party at which Socrates (amongst others) is a guest. Those who talk before Socrates share a tendency to celebrate the instinct of sex and regard love (eros) as a god whose goodness and beauty they compete. However, Socrates sets himself apart from this belief in the fundamental value of sexual love and instead recollects Diotima 's theory of love, suggesting that love is neither beautiful nor good because it is the desire to possess what is beautiful, and that one cannot desire that of which is already possessed. The ultimate/primary objective of love as being related to an absolute form of beauty that is held to be identical to what is good is debated throughout the dialogue, and Diotima expands on this description of love as being a pursuit of beauty (by which one can attain the goal of love) that culminates in an understanding of the form of beauty. The purpose of this paper is to consider the speeches presented (i.e. those of Phaedrus, Pausanias, Eryximachus, Aristophanes, and Agathon) in Plato 's Symposium as separate parts that assist in an accounting of the definition and purpose of platonic love.

His view of knowledge, his ethical theory, his psychology, his concept of the state, and his perspective on art must be understood in terms of this theory. Raphael made him resemble Leonardo da Vinci because, firstly Leonardo was a big influence on him and his works and secondly Leonardo was a man of man talents or virtu's who had a huge impact on the world and the same can be said of Plato. Aristotle: (384-322 BC), Greek philosopher and scientist, who shares with Plato and Socrates the distinction of being the most famous of ancient philosophers. Aristotle, like Plato, made regular use of the dialogue in his earliest years at the Academy, but lacking Plato's imaginative gifts never found the form to his liking. His works on natural science include Physics, which gives a vast amount of information on astronomy, meteorology, plants, and animals. His writings on the nature, scope, and properties of being, were called the First Philosophy. Diogenes: (412-323 BC) Greek philosopher,. He was a founder of Cynicism, an ancient school of philosophy. He is said to have lived in a tub in Athens and to have wandered the streets with a lamp, seeking an honest man. In the picture is sitting by himself on the stairs, reading, and that could symbolize the years he spent alone. Euclid:(325-265)Greek mathematician who taught in Alexandria and who was probably the founder of its mathematical school. His chief work is the 13-volume Elements, which became the most widely known mathematical

The first speech of the symposium was given by Phaedrus, and thankfully, it is not very deep or difficult to understand. The key to understand his speech and most of the following speeches is to understand the Greek habit of ascribing a pseudo-divinity to almost every facet of everything. In this case, Phaedrus is equating mythological being called Eros to the human concept of love. Unfortunately, Phaedrus ' speech does little to directly define the nature of love, instead, Phaedrus decides

In the Symposium by Plato, seven great speaker talk about love. In each speech they discuss what does love mean to them. In one of these speeches love makes the most sense and can be agreeable. In another speech makes sense also but disagreeable. These two speeches are spoken by Aristophanes; a comic poet, and Agathon.

Overdosing on the drug Love is something that many people do quite often without even knowing it, until they experience the withdrawal symptoms. Book IV of the Aeneid by Virgil focuses mainly on Queen Dido and Aeneas’s love relationship. After Queen Dido falls in love with Aeneas he leaves her in Carthage to go focus on his own duties. Dido doesn't take this very well and the withdrawal symptoms of the love they had are fatal. Love is just as powerful as a drug.

Plato’s Symposium gives us a look into how philosophers of the past viewed romantic love. Of all the speeches given in this work, Aristophanes had one of the most interesting theories. His theory referred to a myth in which at one point humans were very powerful. Because of these past humans’ strength, the god Zeus decided to cut them all in half, forming two beings. Now, we as separated humans are desperately trying to be reunited with our literal “other half.” With this myth in mind, Aristophanes theorizes that love is that pursuit of wholeness with our significant other. Socrates takes a different approach when explaining his theory of love. Instead of focusing on love in the romantic and sexual sense, as the others did, Socrates explains how love is the pursuit of happiness. With that in mind the question is asked what, to humanity, would true happiness be perceived as? Socrates’ answer: Immortality. Since immortality is unrealistic, humans must resort to immortalizing themselves by means of creation. Whether that be by leaving a piece of themselves behind in the form of children or a work of art, such as a book or painting. It is that drive for eternal happiness that Socrates believes love to be.

In Plato’s Symposium, Diotima in her discussion on the concept of love, explains how love is improperly viewed; it is not love that is being loved, but rather it is the lover of what is good and beautiful. In other words; it is the aspiration of pursuing beauty in its pure form, and to have this beauty, forever. According to her, it is only through reproduction that we have this beauty immortalized. Through their deep passions, Dido’s love for Aeneas, along with Aeneas’ true love being his duty to the future of Rome encapsulate similar aspects to Diotima’s view on love. By examining these relationships, love can take over complete control of their actions. While both these loves are similar in the sense that love is the driving force in each person’s actions, ultimately what distinguishes the two is the fact that Dido’s love is purely romantic, while Aeneas’ is fate-based and not between two human beings, and these distinctions yield two different results in the end.