From the book
Lysis
Plato · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordAntiphileō means love in return; in the passive, be loved in return.
- In LysisThe prefix ἀντι- marks the return of affection, not opposition to love.
- Reading contextIn particular, a claim about what can be called dear to someone is not automatically a claim about a fully reciprocal friendship.
- A place to readThe Greek example means “Is it not possible to love without being loved back?”
- English renderings
- Love in return; in the passive, be loved in return
Meaning
Love in return; in the passive, be loved in return.
Grammatical category: verb.
Use in the book
The prefix ἀντι- marks the return of affection, not opposition to love. At 212b Socrates distinguishes loving someone from being loved back by that same person. The passive ἀντιφιλεῖσθαι therefore names what the original lover receives; the active ἀντιφιλῶσιν at 212d names the response attributed to the horses. Preserve this difference when following the switches between lover and beloved.
The verb tests whether reciprocity belongs to the definition of φίλος. If a lover can receive no affection, or even hatred, one person’s loving does not automatically establish a mutual relation. Yet requiring a return from every object of affection would exclude horse-lovers and even lovers of wisdom unless horses and wisdom responded. That deliberately awkward consequence exposes a difficulty in transferring an interpersonal condition to every use of the φίλ- vocabulary.
The passage does not establish a final doctrine that all friendship must, or need not, be reciprocal. It successively tries these alternatives. In particular, a claim about what can be called dear to someone is not automatically a claim about a fully reciprocal friendship.