Socrates verdict on Odysseus...

    Through most of book III in the Republic, I've been battling. I have not agreed with everything Socrates suggests, especially his very detailed censorship, however I do like his model for 'just' judges.  Here Socrates, again, stresses the importance of a pure mind. Basically, Socrates says that a 'just' judge is not one who has had experience with minds who are evil, but one who has grown up shunning evil natures.  For how could a judge accurately judge someone, if He himself had practiced or participated in evil nature himself? Would he not then be more lenient toward those evils, instead of judging them by the law?

     "He must be late to learn about injustice. And he must learn about it not as something inhabiting his own soul but as something he has trained himself to understand through long observation as an alien presence in alien souls. He must learn to understand the measure of evil not by way of experience but by dint of knowledge" (409 b)

 He then goes on to say a man like this would be the most noblest or judges and a good one at that. For the man who has a good soul is good. Then he lays out what is not a 'just' or a wise man.

    "But someone who is cunning and quick to suspect evil, someone who counts himself an expert in trickery, someone who keeps his guard up because he always expects to encounter patterns of behavior similar to his own- such a man does appear to be clever when he is with his own kind. But when he is among his elders and in the company of good people he seems instead to be stupid.... Still he consorts with bad people more often than with good; hence he seems both to himself and others wise rather than foolish"

    Now at first, I thought Socrates was depicting Odysseus, for Odysseus was cunning, crafty, definitely shady. He did always suspects something evil of people, and he did seem very clever to his own kind. Yet, this would mean Socrates was saying the Odysseus was not wise. This would have been a huge shocker to Athenians, after all Athena was Odysseus' patron goddess. He was known as a model of wisdom!  However, as I kept pondering this over, I realized that this could apply to the Suitors. They were very clever in their own eyes and with their own kind.  We know, though, that they were hated as foolish wretches by the good, faithful servants of Odysseus.  

   What is Socrates verdict on Odysseus? My opinion is that Socrates would not call Odysseus a 'just' man but not an evil one either. Thus, Odysseus would not be wise. Socrates final take on the matter is this, "I believe that the man with a virtuous nature-and not the evil man- will prove to be the one who is wise". Does this apply to Odysseus?

P.S. I commented on Josh Spell's post.