The Republic (Dover Thrift Editions: Philosophy)

There are no lables for truth. However, the civilization we live in try to tell us that man's civilization is only 6 thousand yrs old & man 10 thousand. Da, not so! This is why they have gnosticism. Because how if man is only six thousand years old, do they have Solon Hermes, Pythagoras, Socraest, Plato, Aristoles, Hippocratics the physcian, just came out knowing all and more than the Doctors of the eary 20th centry. When it comes to Greek Myyhology shows the mistakes in history. After the Dark age know one knew how to read unless they where Royal bloodlines and yet not even, Constantine who was only the Emperor of the East of the Roman Empire and the west had fallen Burn the great library of Alexandria that was made to collect lost knowledge After the Myology of man & war of the Gods. It was a place that was a city of study we will never have such truth,! When Julis Ceaser burnd it and said how could one man conquer the world by 32 years and in the year 48 BC means that he must have at least been in his 50s which was old then. He said the only way to conquer the world was through igorence. Strip them of their knowledge and the truth of man. The 3rd Century Ad to push ignorence & muder those.Created by PtolemyI Soter who was a Macedonian General under Alexander THE GREAT! most Books were kept inPapyrus scrolls Unknowing how many books were taken out at a time 40,000 to 4000.000, at its height!Being burned down from the bloodlines that still rule the world today but mixed with the once Celts meaning the cent land. Name changed after general Germanius as lands to conquer! This burn threw the world into ignorence except the Romans & Hellenistic, = the Semetic taht went to the Creed of Nicien Council of Nicea 325 almost the same time as the Burning that lost all oneness of man. Constantine odered all priest of all belifes to rewrite the history of man, the book of Enoch was of part of Genesis, it spoke of man being very advanced and the war of man and the Gods. ????? Then they murdered all the advanced people and knowledge like Nikola Tesla had to be past down by word of mouth. I love Greek "Mythology, it should becalled lost facts. Pomei was a myth so was troy, now facts. thank the Greeks for holding this great knowledge, Egyptians are just like the rest even though Thoth who is Hermes tought them

Yes, this edition has a long intro, but that intro is an argument by argument exegesis (explanation) of Plato's Republic with extensive quotes and commentary that lay clear its virtues and its flaws as seen from a modern perspective. The Republic is Plato's ideal society, but mustn't an ideal society be based on Justice? So first before we can realize an ideal society, we must achieve justice (or an understanding of it). This is where Plato starts. Socrates, acting as Plato's mouthpiece, asks, "What is Justice." Each guest answers starting with the host who gives the weakest but most obvious answer: Justice is doing good to your friends and evil to your enemies. Socrates examines and dismantels each argument as they are presented. What if the person you think is a friend is not your friend? What if you friend lends you a gun - he then goes crazy and asks for the gun back. The arguments get stronger in succession till Mr. T. proposes that "Might makes right." The tyrant makes justice synonymous with their interests: I am the state and your country right or wrong. On the question of whether justice = happiness: (from the commentary), Let a man do his duty first without asking whether he will be happy or not, happiness will be the inseparable accident which attends him. 'Seek ye first the kingdom of god and and his righteousness, and all thes things shall be added unto you.' Is the just person happy on the rack? Well, maybe not. If you wish to pay for a version with a nice index, feel free, but one of the other reveiws provides the chapter index location numbers. Now I admit I've only read to location 600, but when i've tried to read the Republic on my own it was somewhat perplexing. For those genuses who only need Einsten's equations to feret out the meaning of relativity the intro is superfluous, but to those like me whose intellignece is 'Shockingly limited' I recommend this edition, and the price is right. BTW I paid $$ for a Philosophy 101 course where this book was all we read and professor's lectures were substantially what is in this intro. Mike the K

This is set-up in two parts. The first part is a discussion amongst a group of deep thinkers about all ten books of the Republic. That is about 335 pages long. If you're still reading now the real story the ten books of the Republic begins in the Part 2 section. Here you will find the actual translation into English. All Ten books in a readable format.. It is a an unwieldy tomb. Read a book a day and it gives you time to absorb it all.

I teach the Republic to High School students and have been using the translation by Griffith (Cambridge) for many years. For reasons I don't recall, I have thought Jowett's translation unreliable and so have avoided it. On a lark, I decided to reread The Republic in Jowett's translation and found it fantastic. I am not qualified to judge its accuracy of translation, as I only know the smallest amount of Greek. But, even though I have read this marvelous dialog many times, I felt that I was understanding some of the content in ways I had not previously experienced. I will continue to teach from Griffith, as its scholarly reputation is solid, but I will not be shy of reading Jowett's version in the future - neither his version of The Republic or other of Plato's dialogs.

I would highly recommend that everyone read Plato’s Republic to gain more comprehensive understanding of western society and how various form of government are constructed; as well as expanding one’s understanding of philosophy.

The book The Republic wasn't as good as I thought it was going to be. I had heard of the title in a movie I watched on TV about girls in juvenile prison to serve a term there. And there was a girl trying to get one of the in mates to read . And she was making quotes from the book. It sounded interesting. But I find it hard to get into. It is the type of book you could go back and refer back to something Plato had said and made a point of. All and all I wouldn't have bought it if I took it out in the library before hand and saw what it was like. Edna Orourke

I'm trying to alternate between fun audiobooks and ones that I feel I should read rather than having any desire to do so. Plato's Republic was in that second group. I honestly expected to hate it. But it's one of the fundamental classics. So on the list it goes to listen to while I commute. And I loved it. It may have been that it was a full cast audio but it honestly did feel like being with a group. Maybe a quarter of the way in I realized what it reminded me of: when you are at a very mellow party in college and people start discussing things that are really "deep, man." And there's that one person who is way too into it and dominates the conversation. So that tickled me most of the book. The other thing that was really engaging was how much of the ideas in this book can be seen in the modern world. In that way it made it feel like an anthropological study and it kept making me say, "neat," even when I disagreed with whatever point was being made. Overall I would recommend this audiobook version because it made it come alive.

To think so many supposedly modern “new” conflicts and struggles could be so timeless as to be discussed here is amazing to me. It makes you wonder if, somehow, thousands of years before Plato there was some yet another similar precursor work of art or philosophy or theory of mankind, and before that too, and so on to the very birth of our species.