Plato’s Alcibiades Theme of Love
Plato and Love
According to Plato, the ultimate object of love is usually the pursuit of wisdom and immortality. Love is thus the central theme in Plato’s dialogue of the symposium. On this concept of love, Plato is mostly interested in love between two people who are of the same sex, for example, a young man and an older man. However, in his theory of love, Plato asserts that, “These kinds of relationships are not guided by romance and other sexual intentions” (Plato, 2015) He, however, wants us to distinguish between love and friendship and that people should concentrate on friendship because it is pure (Dickinson, 2016). He makes us understand the meaning of platonic love which entails that kind of relationship that is pure and spiritual. Plato gives us an example that if a girl and a boy hung out yet they are not boyfriend and girlfriend, this kind of love is the best because it is not physical.
The theme of Plato’s Alcibiades truly implies the nature of love. The dialogue that Plato uses so as to strengthen his concept of love indicates that we should understand god Eros and the behavior that this god inspires in human beings (Plato, 2015). If we understand god Eros, we will know the value of love in him by observing the behavior that he inspires in us (Dickinson, 2016). “The Symposium by Plato theme of love, it is described as the possession of wisdom, beauty, and good things” (Plato, 2015). He adds that the ultimate item of love is the pursuit of wisdom, beauty, and immortality. For example, Alcibiades, who is having a relationship with Socrates helps to link Socrates to Eros. This is heavenly love and as described by Plato, this love is homosexual (Plato). However, even though Plato has given the theme of love a proper backup, Socrates greatly challenges this thought and notion (Plato, 2015). He claims that love exists between ugliness and beauty and that it is a spit between the mortal between the mortal and the immortal.