Method
Ion (dialogue)
Overview
In Plato's Ion (; Ancient Greek: Ἴων) Socrates discusses with the titular character, a professional rhapsode who also lectures on Homer, the question of whether the rhapsode, a performer of poetry, gives his performance on account of his skill and knowledge or by virtue of divine possession. It is one of the shortest of Plato's dialogues.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Ion (dialogue) is discussed.
ION: That is true. SOCRATES: Then, my dear friend, can I be mistaken in saying that Ion is equally skilled in Homer and in other poets, since he himself acknowledges that the same person will be a good judge of all those who speak of the same things; and that almost all poets do speak of the same things? ION: Why then, Socrates, do I lose attention and go to sleep and have absolutely no ideas of the least value…
Plato, Ion
names the idea; a chapter is titled for it; states what it is; the book is about it; author linked in the graph; opens on it
Ion, however, who must needs make virtue, like a show of tragedies, include some comic scenes, we shall not altogether rely upon; Zeno used to bid those who called Pericles's gravity the affectation of a charlatan, to go and affect the like themselves; inasmuch as this mere counterfeiting might in time insensibly instill into them a real love and knowledge of those noble qualities.
Plutarch, Plutarch
names the idea
Ion relates that when he was a young man, and had recently come from Chios to Athens, he chanced to sup with Cimon, at Laomedon's house. After supper, when they had, according to custom, poured out wine to the honor of the gods, Cimon was desired by the company to give them a song, which he did with sufficient success, and received the commendations of…
Plutarch, The Boys' and Girls' Plutarch
opens on it; names the idea
The place of the dialogue in the series cannot be determined with certainty. The style and subject, and the treatment of the character of Socrates, have a close resemblance to the earlier dialogues, especially to the Phaedrus and Euthydemus. The manner in which the ideas are spoken of at the end of the dialogue, also indicates a comparatively early date.
Plato, Cratylus
editorial apparatus; author linked in the graph
How, then, is the Euripidean play related to this ideal of the Apollonian drama? Just as the younger rhapsodist is related to the solemn rhapsodist of the old time. The former describes his own character in the Platonic "Ion" as follows: "When I am saying anything sad, my eyes fill with tears; when, however, what I am saying is awful and terrible, then my hair stands on end through fear, and my heart leaps." Here we…
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
names the idea
Philosophers who discussed Ion (dialogue)
Related ideas
- Gregory Vlastos
- Laws (dialogue)
- Homer
- Hesiod
- Republic (Plato)
- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- Plato
- Symposium (Plato)
- Socrates
- Divination
- Phaedrus (dialogue)
- Ephesus
Place in the tradition
Part of Socrates.