Right and apparent law

Use in the book

Rightness initially characterizes the asking and answering of questions: the companion would not have asked rightly by seeking which gold Socrates means (313a), and it is not right to identify law so simply with a city resolution once base resolutions have been admitted (314e). At 317b–c the same family of words becomes the decisive criterion for the thing under inquiry.

Socrates first applies the criterion to each practical domain. Whatever is right is lawful, whether medical, culinary, or horticultural; what is not right is no longer lawful and becomes lawless. He then applies it to writings about justice, injustice, and the ordering of a city. Correctness is not one desirable quality that a law may happen to lack while retaining the same status. Within this argument, its absence disqualifies the text from being law at all.

The phrase “to those who do not know” identifies the audience of the misleading appearance (317c). The text can be called law, encountered as law, and taken to be law while failing the Socratic standard. This is the sharpest answer to the companion's evidence of inconsistent usages: examples of wrong enactments need not refute law's relation to truth, because they are excluded from the category. The cost is that the ordinary civic use of nomos has been restricted. The dialogue does not revisit each alleged sacrifice or funeral rule to determine its correctness individually.

The recapitulation at 317d accordingly says that law is the finding of what is. Unlike 315a–b2, this sentence contains no “wishes.” It should not be quoted as though the earlier qualification remained verbally present, nor should the earlier statement be rewritten without it. The development is an interpretive issue: the crafts have supplied the criterion under which Socrates now states the definition without qualification, while the practical identification of genuinely knowledgeable civic rule remains to be explored.

Places to read

1. 313aοὐκ ἂν ὀρθῶς ἐρέσθαι — Rightness first concerns the question's form
2. 314eΟὐκ ἄρα ὀρθῶς ἔχει ἀποκρίνεσθαι οὕτως ἁπλῶς — A simple answer is rejected as inadequate
3. 317bὃ μὲν ἂν ὀρθὸν ᾖ, νόμιμον αὐτὸ φήσομεν — Rightness licenses the predicate “lawful”
4. 317cἌνομον ἄρα γίγνεται — What fails the test becomes lawless within the argument
5. 317cὃ δοκεῖ νόμος εἶναι τοῖς μὴ εἰδόσιν — The appearance of law is assigned to those lacking knowledge
6. 317dὈρθῶς ἄρα ὡμολογήσαμεν νόμον εἶναι τοῦ ὄντος εὕρεσιν — The recapitulation makes an unqualified identification and uses “finding”

Translation in this edition

“Right” and “rightly” preserve orthos and orthōs throughout the dialogue. “Lawless,” rather than simply “illegal,” is important at 317c: the defect concerns failure to be genuine law, not merely violation of a separate enacted statute. The edition distinguishes the “finding” here from the “discovery” at 315a.

Know — εἰδέναι (eidenai) · εἰδόσιν (317c).

εἰδέναι (eidenai)

Know. In the negative phrase, those who do not know and therefore take an incorrect civic writing to be law. Attested: εἰδόσιν (317c). Right and apparent law.

Lawful — νόμιμος (nomimos) · νόμιμον (317b).

νόμιμος (nomimos)

Lawful. A status accorded to what is right in a specified practical field. The criterion is correctness, not simply customary acceptance. Attested: νόμιμον (317b). Right and apparent law.

Lawless — ἄνομος (anomos)

ἄνομος (anomos)

Lawless. What an incorrect rule becomes under the argument’s restriction of genuine law to what is right. It need not mean merely prohibited by a separate civic statute. Attested: Ἄνομον (317c). Right and apparent law.

Right — ὀρθός (orthos) · ὀρθὸν (317b).

ὀρθός (orthos)

Right. Correct in the relevant field. Socrates makes this the condition for calling a medical, culinary, or gardening rule lawful. Attested: ὀρθὸν (317b). Right and apparent law.

Right — ὀρθός (orthos) · ὀρθαί (317d).

ὀρθός (orthos)

Right. The predicate applied to the farmer’s laws and distributions because he assigns appropriate seeds to each soil. Attested: ὀρθαί (317d). Right and apparent law.

Rightly — ὀρθῶς (orthōs) · Ὀρθῶς (317d).

ὀρθῶς (orthōs)

Rightly. Qualifying the agreement now recapitulated: law is the finding of what is. Unlike 315a–b2, this sentence contains no verb “wishes.”. Attested: Ὀρθῶς (317d). Right and apparent law.

What seems law to those who do not know (contextual phrase)

317c: ὃ δοκεῖ νόμος εἶναι τοῖς μὴ εἰδόσιν. The relative clause identifies the wrong rule by the appearance it has to non-knowers. Socrates does not deny that it is called law in ordinary life; he rejects that appearance as a sufficient condition for genuine law. The clause is the text's own acknowledgment of the gap between public naming and the stricter standard. See Right law.