Symposium - AIC

Jens Kristian Larsen
by philotimia, love of honour. But is it Phaedrus’ love of honour? This is not a simple question. On
the one hand, what Alcibiades is primarily interested in is publically bestowed honour and, as I have
argued, this is not what Phaedrus is interested in. For Phaedrus, philotimia means ambition for doing
noble acts, which, as its counterpoint, has shamefulness at performing shameful acts. These two
explains why eros, according to Phaedrus, is able to make us like those that are by nature best. But
this points to a connection between Phaedrus’ understanding of eros and the character of Alcibiades.
Alcibiades states that Socrates is the only one before whom he has felt shame. So we see that
Phaedrus’ notion of eros is somehow vindicated in the character of Alcibiades. It is his love of
Socrates that makes him shameful, shameful at caring more about the matters of the Athenians than
about his soul. Perhaps, if he had chosen to sit by Socrates, instead of running off to the many, he
could have overcome his infatuation with the honour bestowed by the public and instead made it a
point of honour to strive for virtue, thereby changing his philotimia from being a hindrance to the
philosophic life into a noble ally.
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