Zalmoxis

Use in the book

Socrates introduces Zalmoxis at 156d through a carefully nested report. Socrates says he learned the charm from a Thracian doctor on campaign; that doctor says that Zalmoxis teaches the priority of the soul in healing. The local chain of authority is therefore not a direct divine revelation to Socrates. It also occurs within the doctor's impersonation agreed with Critias. These narrative conditions should remain attached to the doctrine rather than disappear when it is cited as “Plato's psychosomatic theory.”

The teaching begins from a concession to good Greek doctors: eyes require treatment of the head, and the head requires attention to the whole body. The Thracian extension makes the soul indispensable. Good and bad flow from it to the body and the entire human being; beautiful words generate temperance, after which bodily health can more readily be provided. Zalmoxis thus represents a claimed authority superior to incomplete Greek treatment, but the philosophical work is done by the movement from bodily part to human whole.

At 158b Zalmoxis is paired with Abaris the Hyperborean. If Charmides already has sufficient temperance, even charms associated with such impressive names would be unnecessary. The decisive consideration is the patient's condition, not the prestige of the foreign healer. At the close Socrates returns to the Thracian charm, not to a newly revealed doctrine about Zalmoxis.

Herodotus 4.94–96 gives an independent account of the Getae's belief in going to Zalmoxis after death and records a Greek rationalizing story involving Pythagoras, while distancing himself from its chronology. That testimony supplies cultural background for the extraordinary reputation of Zalmoxis' doctors. It does not prove that the specific medical teaching reported in the Charmides was historically practiced by a Thracian school, or that Plato endorses every story Herodotus records.

Places to read

1. 156d–157bThe Thracian doctor attributes the whole-person healing doctrine to his divine king
2. 158bCharms of Zalmoxis and Abaris are unnecessary if the youth already has temperance
3. 156d (apparatus)23The witnesses differ over Zalmoxis/Zamolxis and doctors/citizens

Translation in this edition

At 156d5 the principal text has “doctors,” whereas Stobaeus has “citizens.” At d5 and d8 the apparatus records Ζαμόλξιδος and Ζάμολξις beside the printed forms. Neither difference authorizes an unqualified historical description of a known professional order.

Ζάλμοξις

Attested: Ζαλμόξιδος / Ζάλμοξις (zalmoxidos / zalmoxis). Zalmoxis, called “our king, who is a god” by the Thracian doctor; his doctors teach healing through the soul, and his charms are recalled when Charmides’ need for treatment is considered. References: 156d, 158b. Lexical identification: lemma: Ζάλμοξις. See Zalmoxis.