GREEK PHILOSOPHY

SUBMITTED BY: HARSHITA DAS

BA HONS(PHILOSOPHY)
FIRST YEAR
ROLL NO. 192609

TOPIC: JUSTICE AS VIRTUE;

THEORY OF JUSTICE
JUSTICE AS VIRTUE IN
STATE & INDIVIDUAL
INTRODUCTION
Philosophical discussion of justice begins with Plato, who treats
the topic in a variety of dialogues, most substantially in
Republic. There Plato offers the first sustained discussion of the
nature of justice (dikaisyne) and its relation to happiness, as a
departure from three alternatives receiving varying degrees of
attention. First, there is a traditionalist conception of justice
(speaking the truth and paying your debts). Second, Plato has
Socrates rebut the Sophist conception of justice which built on a
distinction between nature (phusis) and convention (nomos).
Finally, Plato has Socrates confront a conventionalist conception
of justice that anticipates modern contractarian views, in which
justice — forbearing preying on others in exchange for not being
preyed on by them — is a “second-best alternative,” not as good
as being able to prey at will upon others, but better than being
the prey of others. 
Plato’s method involves the provocative idea that justice in the
city (polis) is the same thing as justice in the individual, just
“writ large.”
 According to Plato, justice is the quality of individual, the
individual mind. It can be understood by studying the mind of
man, its functions, qualities or virtues. Plato developed the
Platonic method, majorly known as dialectic, where students
have to question age-old truths to develop new ideas and
concepts that break with tradition. Plato’s one of the most
known works is The Republic. It is accepted that The Republic
belongs to the dialogues of Plato’s middle period. In the book, a
group decides to create an imaginary city to define what justice
looks like.

Plato’s Theory of Justice

The concept of justice occupies the most important part of
Plato’s The Republic. Sabine says: “The theory of the state in
The Republic culminates in the conception of justice.” He has
treated justice as the bond which holds a society together. Hence
it is the true principle of social life. The Republic deals with the
bond and true principle of social life. The purpose of The
Republic is to ensure justice. The failure will invariably
disintegrate the whole society. The philosopher king will take
every care to establish justice. That is why The Republic is
called a “treatise concerning justice” By elaborating the doctrine
of Justice Plato wanted to combat the false notions which the
Sophists spread. Ideal state is the highest manifestation of
morality, goodness and idealism and, naturally, in such a state
justice cannot be relegated to an inferior position.
Before Plato, many theories of justice were prevalent. The
inquiry about justice goes from the crudest to the most refined
interpretation of it. It remains therefore to inquire what were the
reasons for which he rejected those views. Thus before
discussing Plato's own concept of justice, it is necessary to
analyze those traditional theories of justice were rejected by
him.
1. Traditional theory of cephalus and polemarchus
According to him 'justice consists in speaking the truth and
paying one's debt. Thus Cephalus identifies justice with
right conduct. Polemarchus also holds the same view of
justice but with a little alteration. According to him "justice
seems to consist in giving what is proper to him".
2. Radical theory of thrasymachus
He defines justice as "the interest of the stronger". In the
other words, might is right. For while, every man acts for
himself and tries to get what he can, the strongest is sure to
get what he wants and as in a state the Government is the
strongest, it will try to get and it will get whatever it wants
for itself. Thus, for Thrasymachus justice means personal
interest of the ruling group in any state or we can further
define it as "another's good".
3. Pragmatic theory of glaucon
Glaucon describes the historical evolution of the society
where justice as a necessity had become the shield of the
weaker. Faced with this situation of the society they came
to an agreement and instituted law and government through
a sort of social contract and preached the philosophy of
justice. Therefore, justice in this way is something artificial
and unnatural. It is the "product of convention". It is
through this artificial rule of justice and law that the natural
 selfishness of man is chained. A dictate of the weaker
many, for the interest of the weaker many, as against the
natural and superior power of the stronger few.
These 3 were rejected by Plato, he gave his understanding of
justice. After arguing against above three views of justice, on the
request of Galucon and Adeimantus, Plato in Republic sets out
to define justice in society and in individual.“Justice, which is
the subject of our enquiry, is, as you know, sometimes spoken of
as the virtue of an individual, and sometimes as the virtue of a
State”. Plato applies teleological and architectonic methodology
to explain the concept of justice beginning from the starting
point of human association, on the basis of his basic
assumptions. Above quote indicates that justice operates at two
levels – at the level of Individual and at the level of state or the
society as in his opinion, state is individual writ large. Then in
the larger unit, the quantity of justice is likely to be larger and
more easily discernible. “I propose therefore that we enquire
into the nature of justice and injustice, first as they appear in the
State, and secondly in the individual, proceeding from the
greater to the lesser and comparing them.” He begins to
construct the society from the beginning, when different people
interdependent natures for meeting their survival needs on the
principles of division of labour and exchange. He calls this
naturally evolved association as the first city.
Justice As Virtue In State & Individual
Plato did not use the word justice in any legal sense. Nor did he
attach any legal significance to the term. According to Plato,
justice is that in individual life, different parts of soul are placed
in their proper place, and in social life, each individual and each
class is placed in its proper place. Plato believed that the human
nature is made from, wisdom, courage, and appetite. And each
class according to prevalence of one of this capacities, places in
the social and moral hierarchy. Plato’s justice does not state a
conception of rights but of duties through it is identical with true
liberty. Like courage, self-control, and wisdom, justice is a
virtue. All these four virtues constitute the moral goodness of
the ideal state.
Justice is a quality – an indispensable quality of moral life. It is
condition of the individual and of the state and the ideal state is
the visible embodiment of justice. Again, this moral goodness is
the virtue of both the individual and the state.
The state is the reality of which justice is the idea. Plato
suggests that justice is the virtue or quality of mind. One of the
finest products of mind is society. Both mind and society are
heterogeneous and neither of them can be thrown in one
direction in a concentrated form. Society, like mind, has certain
necessary elements.
Firstly, the society needs food and clothes and thus, the first part
of the society is to produce food and other necessities of life—
artisans and producers.
The second necessity is to defend the society against onslaughts
and this leads to the class of fighters—the soldiers.
The third necessity is government, and so we have the class of
rulers. Plato opined that the producers would correspond to
appetite, the fighters to spirit and the rulers to reason. Every
class must function in co-ordination with each other and
virtuously in its best form. This is possible only when all the
elements of the mind work in unison with each other.
Plato believed that ruin comes when the trader becomes the
ruler, when the general uses his army and establishes his
military dictatorship. So, in order to avoid this ruin, it is advised
that the producer is at his best only in the economic field, the
warrior in the battlefield and either of them in any public office
would only spoil the art of politics.

This is because, statesmanship is a science as well as an art and

one must live for it and be prepared for it. According to Plato,
only a philosopher king is suitable to guide a nation. Plato’s
theory of justice states that until philosophers are kings or the
kings and princes of the world have the spirit and power of
philosophy, and wisdom and political leadership meet in the
same man, cities will never cease from ill, or the human race.
Socrates Argument Opposition
The arguments formulated by Socrates were not accepted by
other scholars and they arose with the opposition including
Plato's brothers, Glaucon and Adeimantus. Glaucon uses a
contradictory method to construct a theory of justice and
defends its implication by a thought experiment. He divides
good things into three classes, things good in themselves, things
good in both themselves and for consequences, things good for
only consequences. Glaucon renews Thrasymachus' argument to
challenge Socrates to defend justice by itself without any
consideration of what comes from it. Adeimantus expands
Glaucon's theory of justice by asserting that the reputation of
justice is better than justice itself, so the unjust person who is
able to keep the reputation of being just will be happier than the
just person, discussion of various ways that the unjust can
acquire the reputation for justice. Further, Plato criticizes and
rejects the views of justice and happiness of his contemporaries.
In an argument against Thrasymachus, Socrates rejects the
identification of justice with legality. It may be true that one can
explore what justice a society believes and practices by looking
at their laws, but its laws might be mistaken and unjust even by
its own lights, since legislation can make no matter what end
they have in view. Moreover, Plato does not use the
contractarian method.
CONCLUSION
In his philosophy Plato gives a prominent place to the idea of
justice. Plato was highly dissatisfied with the prevailing
degenerating conditions in Athens. The Athenian democracy
was on the verge of ruin and was ultimately responsible for
Socrates's death. The amateur meddlesomeness and excessive
individualism became main targets of Plato's attack. This attack
came in the form of the construction of an ideal society in which
justice reigned supreme, since Plato believed justice to be the
remedy for curing these evils. After criticizing the conventional
theories of justice presented differently by Cephalus,
Polymarchus, Thrasymachus and Glaucon, Plato gives us his
own theory of justice according to which, individually, justice is
a 'human virtue' that makes a person self-consistent and good;
socially, justice is a social consciousness that makes a society
internally harmonious and good. According to Plato, justice is a
sort of specialization.