What’s in a Name?

The title of this blog being “Return to Plato’s Cave” is one that is obscure by modern standards. Unless you’re someone that listened intently in college classes or someone that is naturally inclined to read Plato’s “The Republic” (two tendencies that are not common these days) than this choice of words may not immediately conjure much of anything. With that, I would like to take a few minutes to explain my choice of words.

In “The Republic” a cave is described in which men are sitting in chairs that are facing the cave wall. These men do not move from the seat and do not turn their heads. They view what is directly in front of them and nothing more. Behind them is a fire. Between the fire and the men in the chairs are “puppeteers” who hold up items that will cast a shadow on the wall that is seen by the men in the chairs. By doing this, the men may see the shadow of a table or a chair and, without ever seeing the true version of the product, come to know a table by it’s shadow rather than it’s true reality. The corporeal nature of the table itself would be foreign, as would the grain and the texture.

Now Socrates introduces the idea of taking one man out of the cave and introducing him to the outside world. His mind is blown! He is blinded, he can’t fathom such things as a tree or grass. In time, however, he will come to understand nature as the real reality and the shadows on the cave wall as a mere image or reflection of reality.

Socrates (in his timeless genius) than brings in what inspired me to name this blog the title that I have given it. This man that has been taken from the cave returns to it. This time, however, he returns to it to explain to the other men in the chairs what he has seen. Here’s the excerpt from “The Republic”:

“Wouldn’t he remember his first home, what passed for wisdom there, and his fellow prisoners, and consider himself happy and them pitiable? And wouldn’t he disdain whatever honors, praises, and prizes were awarded there to the ones who guessed best which shadows followed which? Moreover, were he to return there, wouldn’t he be rather bad at their game, no longer being accustomed to the darkness? “Wouldn’t it be said of him that he went up and came back with his eyes corrupted, and that it’s not even worth trying to go up? And if they were somehow able to get their hands on and kill the man who attempts to release and lead up, wouldn’t they kill him?”

With this image, I see my faith, I see knowledge, and I see our society. Any Christian should see this image immediately as a shadow (no pun intended) of his walk in a society that thinks him nuts. The child of Christ may say “Hey I have found the Truth! Come with me! Let me show you that you do not need to fear man! Let me show you that there IS such a thing as a perfect Love! Let me show you that there IS an objective Truth and that this world is NOT a degenerate place of subjective realities where you can only end by saying ‘what can anyone really know anyway?’. I have found happiness and let me share it with you!”

And yet what is the typical response? “You’re a hateful person that wants to judge me! Don’t cast stones! Besides, what about science and reason? They proved God to be a myth a long time ago! Don’t talk to me!” You are a corrupt person to those that have not experienced His love. You live in your fantasy world of “trees, grass, and sky” when you should just be content with caves and shadows. But I would ask you this before you get too upset. Would you have been upset if someone came to you while still in the cave and told you that you were duped? Would you have been angry? It is not by argument but by love that someone is convinced. It is not by logic but by the work of the cross that we are led back to our true Father.

“And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. “
1 Corinthians 13:13

If we believe this than why do we so readily discard the greatest in an effort to beat someone into submission with our logic? I am guilty of this one many times myself and yet I am reminded that I did not believe in the redemption of the cross because of science but because I knew God’s love to be true by it’s practical application in my wife. By her faith I was shown what Christ looked like in action and in deed. Whether I believed or not I knew Him to be working in her and could no longer deny it. This is what finally won my heart. Not a grand argument (though I am a lover of knowledge) but rather love shown by the deeds of one that had every right to shun me. When I attempted to sabotage the relationship out of fear of intimacy and to make her hate me, I was rejoined with love, patience, and self sacrifice. The greatest of these was and still is love.

I’ve run long on this one but I did mention that I see the cave allegory in both knowledge and our culture as well. I’ll return to these later, perhaps as the next post.