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Objections of Plato:: Plato Objection To Poetry From The Point of Education

Plato had three main objections to poetry: 1) From an educational standpoint, he believed that poetry cultivates bad habits in children rather than practical skills. 2) Philosophically, he argued that poetry is removed from truth and deals with appearances rather than ideas. 3) Morally, he felt that poetry appeals to and strengthens the passions rather than reason, making it an immoral influence.

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622 views

Objections of Plato:: Plato Objection To Poetry From The Point of Education

Plato had three main objections to poetry: 1) From an educational standpoint, he believed that poetry cultivates bad habits in children rather than practical skills. 2) Philosophically, he argued that poetry is removed from truth and deals with appearances rather than ideas. 3) Morally, he felt that poetry appeals to and strengthens the passions rather than reason, making it an immoral influence.

Uploaded by

Saima Zain
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Objections of Plato:

Plato objected to poetry on three grounds:


 Education
 Philosophical
 Moral View Point
Plato's three main objections to poetry are that poetry is not ethical, philosophical and pragmatic, in other
words, he objected to poetry from the point of view of education, from philosophical point of view and
from moral point of view. ... Plato than makes a challenge to poets to defend themselves against his
criticism.

Plato Objection to poetry from the point of education:


In Book II of "The Republic", he condemns poetry for promoting bad habits and vices in
children.
Plato objected poetry on the basis of education, by saying that it cultivates evil habits and not
practical. But it is not so about all the poems or all the arts. As at that time Homer's epics were
the part of studies and in them heroes were lusty, cunning and cruel dealing only with war and
other things.
Plato says that if we intend for our future saints to regard the habit of quarreling among
themselves as all the most abominable things, we must not say to them a word about the war in
heaven, or about the conspiracies and battles of the gods against each other, because they are not
right ... If only believed like us, we would tell them that the quarrel was not pious, and that until
now there has never been a quarrel between the citizens ... they should have or not had an
allegorical meaning
Thus, he objected on the ground that poetry does not cultivate good habits among children

Objection from Philosophical point of view:


In `The Republic` Book X: Poetry does not lead to, but drives us away from the realization of the
ultimate reality – the Truth.
Philosophy is better than poetry because Philosophy deals with idea and poetry is twice removed
from original idea. Poetry tends toward the imaginative world, in which poet use alienation to
make his content more attractive
Plato said: “Imitators or creators of images know nothing of true existence; only know
aspects…. The art of imitation is an inferior who marries an inferior and has
inferior children.

Objection from the Moral point of view:


As a moralist Plato disapproves of poetry because it is immoral, as a philosopher he disapproves
of it because it is based in falsehood. He says that philosophy is better than poetry because
philosopher deals with idea/truth, whereas poet deals with what appears to him.
Poetry waters and nourishes the baser impulses of men emotional, sentimental and sorrowful.
Plato says: “Then the imitative poet who aims at being popular is not by nature made, nor is his
art intended, to please or to affect the rational principle in the soul; but he will prefer the
passionate and fitful temper, which is easily limited …. And therefore, we shall be right in
refusing to admit him into a well-ordered state, because he awakens and nourishes and
strengthen the feelings and impairs the reason … Poetry feeds and waters the passion instead of
drying them up; she lets them rule, although they ought to be controlled, if mankind is ever to
increase in happiness and virtue.”
(Zain-ul-Abdin)

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